Summary
- The 8 October AI for Energy report gives installed Italian data centre IT capacity of 609MW in 2025.
- Its scenarios reach approximately 0.9GW, 1.2GW or 1.8GW by 2030 depending on conditions.
- Much of the historical capacity figure had previously been published; the new element is the dated scenario analysis and energy-system framing.
Research presented by Politecnico di Milano on 8 October projects several potential growth paths for Italy’s data centre capacity through 2030, highlighting the difference between computing installations that already exist and far larger quantities of electricity capacity requested for proposed developments.
The AI for Energy research reports installed Italian data centre capacity of 609MW at the end of 2025, more than double the approximately 282MW recorded in 2020. That historical figure had already circulated earlier in 2026; the October publication is best understood as a fresh presentation of scenarios and grid implications rather than the discovery of previously unknown installed capacity.
Three development scenarios, not a forecast contract
The study sets out illustrative 2030 outcomes of approximately 0.9GW, 1.2GW and 1.8GW under lower, intermediate and higher growth conditions. The upper scenario is dependent on a more favourable development and investment environment. None is the same as an announced programme of facilities that are all approved, financed and connected.
Data centre IT power refers to the equipment load inside operational computing facilities. Incoming electrical requirements are greater once power conversion losses, cooling and other auxiliary uses are included. A planned IT rating, a grid application and recorded energy consumption must therefore be kept in separate columns when comparing data centre pipelines.
The research also points to a concentration of installed infrastructure around Milan, reflecting the city’s role as an existing connectivity and business market. Concentration can offer access to networks and specialist services, but it can also place additional demands on substations, transmission capacity and industrial sites suitable for new buildings.
Grid requests are much larger than connected loads
Italy’s transmission operator has recorded substantial volumes of requests for new or expanded electrical connections associated with data centre proposals. Such requests are signals of developer interest, not a schedule of guaranteed new demand. Applications may overlap, be revised or fail to reach the point of signed connection and construction.
The difference affects electricity-network planning and investment decisions. A utility must evaluate possible future demand when considering reinforcement programmes, but equipment procurement and actual consumption depend on the pace at which projects clear planning, finance and customer contracting.
Cooling also contributes to the eventual load and environmental profile. A facility designed around direct liquid cooling may move heat efficiently from racks, yet still need a heat rejection or reuse route. The electricity and water effects of the overall system cannot be determined from the IT capacity figure alone.
The October research frames growing AI workloads as one potential driver of these new connections. AI-related demand is not uniform, however: training, inference and ordinary enterprise applications place different requirements on rack power density, utilisation and redundancy.
The research counts 262 operating data centres in Italy at the beginning of October, with around 45% located in Lombardy and roughly 414MW of capacity concentrated in the Milan area. Those figures describe facilities and installed power that already exist; they do not represent new energy connections made available during October.
Contemporaneous accounts of the report put high- and extra-high-voltage connection requests at about 101.4GW. The figure is an aggregate of requests, many of which may never result in completed developments. It is much larger than the research group’s scenario for delivered data centre capacity in 2030, reinforcing the need to distinguish an application queue from an infrastructure forecast.
Realisation of the projected scenarios depends on developers securing suitable land, timely power connections, agreed environmental conditions and sustained customer demand. The report provides a structured range of possible outcomes rather than confirmation that Italy has already built the upper-end 1.8GW scenario.
