Spain unveiled a more flexible version of its proposed data-centre decree on Monday, easing the rules for new facilities, according to Reuters, citing energy ministry officials. The revision raises the threshold from facilities above 1 megawatt to those above 10 megawatts, extends the window for matching new energy use with new renewable capacity from 18 months to 36 months before a facility starts operating, and adds a transition period of up to five years for meeting the clean-power target. The 80% hourly clean-energy requirement itself stays in place. The revision follows a wave of project announcements in Spain, which Reuters describes as one of Europe’s hottest hubs for artificial-intelligence infrastructure, with projects worth tens of billions of euros.
What The Revised Decree Changes
The threshold change is the widest of the three easings. Under the initial proposal, the rules would have applied to any facility with more than 1 megawatt of power capacity. The revised proposal lifts that line to more than 10 megawatts, so smaller facilities fall outside the decree altogether. For developers planning modest sites, the revision removes a layer of compliance that the first draft would have imposed from a low bar.
The second change gives developers more time to line up renewable energy. Originally, every new megawatt of energy a facility used had to be matched by a new megawatt of renewable energy installed in the 18 months before the facility starts operation. The revised proposal extends that window to 36 months before operation begins. Solar energy gets a further break: under the revision, there is no time limit at all for solar capacity matched against a facility’s energy use.
The third change softens the deadline rather than the target. The proposal still requires renewable energy to cover at least 80% of a data centre’s energy supply for every hour of operation. What is new is an alternative route to that standard: a transition period of up to five years to reach the threshold, available under several conditions. Reuters does not detail those conditions.
The Clean-Power Target That Stays
For all the easing elsewhere, the hourly standard itself survives intact. An 80% hourly matching rule is a demanding bar: it measures clean coverage hour by hour, rather than averaged across a year, so a facility cannot offset dirty hours with clean ones at other times. The transition period gives developers up to five years to reach that bar, but it does not lower it. The shape of the revision is therefore a longer runway to the same destination, not a different destination.
That distinction matters for how the decree will be read by developers. A facility that can show its renewable matching over 36 months, rather than 18, has twice the window to bring new capacity online before opening. A solar-heavy project faces no matching deadline at all. And a project that cannot meet the hourly standard on day one now has a defined path of up to five years to get there, rather than an immediate obligation it might fail.
Why It Matters
Spain’s revision lands in the middle of a European contest for AI infrastructure. Reuters notes that the country combines abundant renewable energy with large swaths of empty land, and that combination has already drawn a wave of project announcements tied to AI infrastructure worth tens of billions of euros. Rules that govern how those facilities power themselves therefore shape where developers choose to build, and how fast they can move once they do.
The revision eases the path for new capacity without abandoning the clean-energy ambition that framed the first draft. Smaller projects escape the rules entirely at the new 10-megawatt threshold, mid-sized projects gain a longer renewable-matching window, and every covered project gains time to reach the hourly standard. For developers weighing Spain against other European hubs, the message of the revision is that the country wants the investment and is willing to adjust its conditions to keep it, while holding the hourly clean-energy line. Power has already decided the fate of AI infrastructure elsewhere in Europe, as Microsoft’s withdrawal from the Loughton data centre in Britain showed, and Spain’s move is an attempt to keep its own pipeline moving.
Background
Spain has emerged as one of Europe’s hottest data-centre hubs on the strength of its renewable resources and available land, attracting AI infrastructure projects worth tens of billions of euros, according to Reuters. The proposed decree is the government’s attempt to set the terms on which that buildout proceeds, balancing the pull of new investment against the strain new facilities place on the energy system. The revision unveiled on Monday is the latest step in that balancing act, and it sits alongside a wider European pattern of governments writing rules for AI infrastructure, from export controls to the EU AI Act’s staged obligations for AI systems.
Source: Reuters: “Spain data-centre rules“
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