Rockliff announced plans for a single local community benefit fund last month, days after Firmus's scrapped initial public offering, which unravelled amid investor concerns about the company's finances, expansion plans and social licence. Rockliff said the expectations document would be reviewed within six months.
For Tasmania's largest AI data centre company, Firmus, its 104MW facility at St Leonards would contribute $312,000 a year. The company has also proposed a 288MW centre at Long Reach near Bell Bay and a 40MW centre at Wesley Vale in the state's north-west.
At Friday's press conference, Rockliff and Industry Minister Felix Ellis spoke of a single fund governed by “local people” and “local representatives” who would allocate grants to “community groups and other eligible organisations”. There would instead be several funds, controlled by the companies themselves. The statement of expectations also outlines “transparent governance arrangements” and requires public reporting.
Greens MP Tabatha Badger said she was “very curious” about how the funds would be run. “How do Tasmanians have the confidence that these companies are actually going to fairly engage with them and invest in the things that matter to Tasmanians?” she said.
Rockliff said data centres were a good investment for Tasmania that the government welcomed. “But the guardrails are important, particularly when it comes to community expectations, when it comes to transparency and when it comes to investing back in the local community.” Ellis said proponents who did not follow the expectations “won't be able to proceed”, noting that data centre developers already had to meet many statutory rules in areas such as planning and environmental requirements.
The state government has been under pressure to increase regulation of the sector, with opponents questioning where the energy and water used by the AI data factories will come from. For the St Leonards facility, state energy company Aurora has contracted energy supply for the initial stage but does not have a long-term deal. Energy Minister Nick Duigan said proponents were “required” to partner with new renewable energy projects, and could do so through Hydro Tasmania. “So Hydro would go out and contract with the new renewable energy providers and act as an aggregator to provide a firmed energy product to the data centre,” he said.
Industry representatives commented on the fund. Russell Kelly, chief executive of technology sector advocate TasICT, said the expectations “put the onus” on data centre proponents to build trust with the community, and that the proposed amount was in line with other proposals in the nation. “The tech sector can see this fund building benefits broader than the development itself,” he said. “We can see a pipeline of young Tasmanians getting jobs in technology. We can see closer association between the University of Tasmania and TasTAFE.” Fiona Turner of start-up hub Enterprize said giving skills back to locals around AI was very important, especially with data centres in the state.