Drax, Brookfield and Radiant plan to build a Drax data centre at the power station in North Yorkshire, starting with up to 100MW of capacity from early 2028 and aiming for gigawatt scale after 2031. Brookfield estimates that total investment “could potentially exceed £20bn”, including an initial £2.5bn for the first phase, Drax said on 3 November.
The backing comes from a joint venture between Brookfield, the Canadian asset manager, and Qai, whose part the UK science minister described as investment from Qatar. Radiant, Brookfield’s UK-headquartered AI infrastructure company, would design and run the site. Little of this is settled yet. The first phase still needs planning permission, grid and regulatory approval, a paying tenant, commercial contracts and a final investment decision from each partner.
In brief
- Phase 1 targets up to 100MW from early 2028 on grid power. Phase 2 aims for 500MW more between 2028 and 2031, fed directly by the power station.
- Brookfield’s £20bn-plus figure is an estimate of the full build, including chips. Only the £2.5bn first phase has a timetable, and it is conditional.
- A public consultation is expected to start this month, weeks after the government rejected a bigger AI Growth Zone bid built around the same site.
Three phases at Drax Power Station
According to Drax’s stock exchange announcement, the first phase would draw power from the grid through Drax’s existing connections. Radiant will lead on design and on finding anchor customers before construction starts, while Drax handles land, power and planning. A planning application is being prepared.
The second phase is “an ambition”, in the filing’s word, to add 500MW between 2028 and 2031 using Drax’s own generation. That would be a behind-the-meter arrangement, meaning the plant supplies the data centre directly rather than through the public grid, under a long-term power purchase agreement. A third phase after 2031 would use the same model.
The filing ties phase two to Drax’s existing support deal. In November 2025 Drax signed a Contract for Difference with the government to generate about 6TWh of biomass power a year from April 2027 to March 2031. That contract lets Drax ask for up to 500MW to be used for a data centre, but only with the agreement of the government and the Low Carbon Contracts Company, which will weigh value for consumers, energy security and sustainability.
The site covers 1,000 acres, with 4GW of grid access and 2.6GW of active generation that can be switched on when needed, Drax says.
Why the partners point to the Data Centre Covenant
The partners say their first assessment is that the project fits the Data Centre Covenant, the five tests on bills, community investment, environment, jobs and security that the government published with the Budget on 28 October. Strategic sites that pass those tests can get help with faster grid connections. Drax and its partners also plan a voluntary community benefits fund, separate from planning obligations.
The site has been here before. In October the government rejected York and North Yorkshire’s AI Growth Zone bid, which centred on a 1.2GW data centre around Drax. At the time Drax said it still planned to seek permission for a smaller first phase of 100MW.
Grid access and customers have shaped other recent projects. Reuters linked Microsoft’s withdrawal as anchor tenant at Nscale’s Loughton site in Essex to power connection delays. In Korea, Brookfield’s deal to fund up to $9bn of compute for Naver came with Naver’s cloud arm signed up as the customer.
“If constructed in full, this project could become one of the largest data centres in the UK,” Drax chief executive Will Gardiner said. Science minister Chris McDonald called it “a strong vote of confidence in the UK and a sign of the strength of our growing partnership with Qatar”.
Radiant’s chief executive, Mahdi Yahya, set out the case in a company blog post. He wrote that “the government says the UK needs at least 6GW of AI-capable capacity by 2030” and that “with more than 50GW of data centers waiting in the transmission queue, Drax is one of the few sites in the country that can supply power at this scale.” He added that the deal “comes at a time when the markets are expressing considerable doubt about the viability of many nascent neoclouds”.
A power station’s answer to the grid queue
The real asset here is the connection, not the land. Power for data centres in Britain is mostly a matter of waiting, and a site that already holds 4GW of grid access skips much of that wait. That is why an existing power station has become one of the more credible places to put AI computing in the country, and why Loughton is the cautionary tale: a good site without timely power can lose its tenant.
The £20bn headline needs care. It is Brookfield’s estimate of a full build, chips included, across three phases, two of which are described only as ambitions. The firm figure is a conditional £2.5bn for 100MW, and even that waits on a tenant. The Naver deal shows the usual pattern, in which big capital arrives with a named customer attached. Drax does not yet have one.
Phase two also depends on a political call. Diverting subsidised biomass output to a private data centre needs the government and the Low Carbon Contracts Company to agree that it serves consumers. That is a question about public money, not only engineering, and the partners have not said how they would answer it.
What to watch next
The first public test is the consultation due this month, followed by the planning application. The clearest sign that the project is real will be an anchor tenant, since Radiant says it will seek customer commitments before building. Until then, the 100MW phase is a plan with a site and backers, and the £20bn is a ceiling, not a cheque.
Sources
- Drax: “Drax, Brookfield and Radiant announce £20bn partnership to deliver GW-scale data centre capacity at Drax Power Station”, 3 November 2026
- Drax Group plc, RNS 5051B: “Strategic partnership for GW-scale data centre”, 3 November 2026
- Radiant (Mahdi Yahya): “How Long Duration Capital Operates – Our Partnership with Drax”, 3 November 2026
- HM Treasury: “The Data Centre Covenant”, 28 October 2026
Related stories
- UK Rejects York and North Yorkshire’s AI Growth Zone Bid Built Around a 1.2GW Data Centre at Drax
- UK Sets Five Tests Data Centres Must Pass for Faster Grid Connections
- Microsoft Pulls Out of Nscale’s Loughton AI Data Centre in Essex
- Naver Signs $9bn Brookfield Compute Deal, Clearing Way for Nvidia
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