As the AI race reaches white-hot temperatures, big tech companies are caught up in a heated race to build as many pollution-belching and power-sucking data centers as they can.
And while the Trump administration is largely clearing their way by easing environmental rules for the polluting facilities, other governments are less inclined to give companies a pass.
As Finnish newspaper Kaleva reported last month, Google is under fire for clearing over 300 hectares — the equivalent of almost 500 football fields — for two new data centers in the northern part of the European nation without concluding the necessary environmental assessments.
Despite the assessments still being in progress, the tech giant’s contractors started clearing trees in the area months ago, raising the alarm bells at the Finnish Nature Conservation Association.
“Either this is gross incompetence from Google’s Finnish project company, Tuike Finland Oy, or gross disregard for Finnish legislation, or at worst both,” said the association’s chair, Hanna Halmeenpää, in a statement, as translated by Wood Central.
Satellite images show that four separate sites were bulldozed to make way for two new data centers.
Google maintains that its felling of the trees met the requirements of the country’s Forestry Act and that it had completed extensive environmental evaluations.
Nonetheless, the Finnish Nature Conservation Association has since asked Finnish regulators to suspend activities until the conclusion of the ongoing environmental assessments.
Halmeenpää said she was worried that local bird species may have been impacted by the area being razed. The forest also serves as a critical ecological connection, allowing animals to spread from one habitat to another.
The incident highlights the explosive growth in new AI data center projects across the globe, a major infrastructure undertaking that could have a significant impact on the local environment.
Meanwhile, Google is hoping to appease the Finnish government by having picked it for its largest single investment in the continent, to the tune of $15 billion.
More on data centers: Data Centers Are a $6 Trillion Time Bomb, Analysts Warn
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