分析显示，德雷克斯（Drax）计划建设的数据中心每年将燃烧490万吨木材，其产生的排放量几乎是盖特威克机场所有航班年排放量的两倍。活动人士称，这将使其成为“最脏的数据中心之一”。
Drax’s planned datacentre could produce nearly double the emissions of all flights out of Gatwick airport each year by burning 4.9m tonnes of wood annually, an analysis has shown. Campaigners say this would make it “one of the dirtiest datacentres out there”.
去年，能源公司德雷克斯公布了计划，将其位于北约克郡的生物质发电厂的一部分改建为数据中心，以应对人工智能算力需求的激增。
Last year, the energy company Drax unveiled plans to convert part of its biomass power plant in North Yorkshire into a datacentre in response to the increase in demand for AI capability.
人工智能数据中心需要消耗大量电力来驱动服务器和冷却设备，并运行设施系统。目前，有315个数据中心排队等待接入英国电网，总需求达73吉瓦。这几乎是英国整个冬季峰值能源需求的两倍。
AI datacentres use a massive amount of electricity to power servers and cooling equipment, and to run facility systems. There are currently 315 datacentres in the queue to connect to the UK’s electricity grid, representing 73GW of demand. This is almost double the peak winter energy demand for the entire UK.
在公开文件中，德雷克斯表示，正在开发一个1.2吉瓦数据中心的方案，其中100兆瓦的电力来自电网，其余部分来自其自有电站。
In public documents, Drax says it is developing options for a 1.2GW datacentre, with 100MW of this energy coming from the electricity grid and the rest from its own power station.
德雷克斯发电厂目前燃烧数百万吨进口木材来生产能源。这种做法一直被誉为一种清洁的能源生产方式，甚至可能实现“负排放”，因为替代森林在生长过程中会从空气中吸收二氧化碳。
The Drax power station currently burns millions of tonnes of imported wood to create energy. This has been touted as a clean way of producing energy that could even result in “negative emissions”, as replacement forests take up CO2 from the air when they are grown.
然而，科学家和环境专家强烈反对这种核算方法，研究人员发现，此类系统可能需要150年才能实现“碳负排放”。
However, scientists and environmental experts strongly contest this accounting approach, with researchers finding such systems could take 150 years to be “carbon negative”.
根据德雷克斯2025年年度报告中的信息，自然资源保护委员会（NRDC）估算，如果建成，德雷克斯的数据中心每年将需要490万吨木材。
Based on information in Drax’s 2025 annual report, the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) estimated that if built, Drax’s datacentre will require 4.9m tonnes of wood each year.
该活动组织计算出，由此产生的总排放量为每年860万吨二氧化碳。这一计算基于数据中心全年每小时均以恒定速率运行的假设。
The campaign group calculated the total emissions from this to be 8.6m tonnes of CO2 per year. This is based on an assumption that the datacentre would run at a constant rate for all hours of the year.
这几乎是盖特威克机场所有航班二氧化碳总排放量的两倍，后者在2024年的测量值为479万吨。
This is nearly double the total CO2 emissions of all flights from Gatwick airport, which measured 4.79m tonnes in 2024.
NRDC的高级倡导者马特·威廉姆斯表示，这将使其成为“最肮脏的数据中心之一”。
Matt Williams, a senior advocate for NRDC, said this would make it “one of the dirtiest datacentres out there”.
行动组织“全球行动计划”的政策主管奥利弗·海耶斯说：“为了为服务器农场供电而焚烧数百万棵树，这种行为毫无道理可言。”不过，该数据中心尚未进入正式的规划程序。但德拉克斯公司表示，只要获得必要的批准，该中心最迟可在2031年全面投入运营。
Oliver Hayes, head of policy at the campaign group Global Action Plan, said, “Burning millions of trees to power server farms is indefensible.”The datacentre has not yet entered the formal planning process, however Drax said subject to it securing the necessary consents, it could be fully operational from 2031.
威廉姆斯说：“政府必须紧急为数据中心设定最低标准，并排除焚烧树木等污染严重的能源生产方式。”
“The government must urgently set minimum standards for datacentres and rule out dirty energy generation like burning trees,” Williams said.
随着这些高能耗的数据中心如何与政府具有法律约束力的净零排放目标相协调的问题日益受到关注，要求提高透明度的呼声也越来越高。
There is growing pressure for more transparency over how these energy intensive datacentres will align with the government’s legally binding net zero targets.
此前有报道称，仅位于白金汉郡和贝德福德郡的两个计划中的数据中心，其碳排放量就将超过埃克森美孚公司。对此，工党议员兼下议院环境审计委员会主席托比·珀金斯表示：“如果没有适当的措施，数据中心可能会对环境以及我们具有法律约束力的气候目标构成严重威胁。”海耶斯称，政府缺乏协调一致的政策是一种“职责的彻底放弃”。
In response to previous reports that just two planned datacentres in Buckinghamshire and Bedfordshire will have higher UK carbon emissions than ExxonMobil, Toby Perkins, a Labour MP and chair of the Commons environmental audit committee, said “without the right measures in place, datacentres could represent a serious threat to the environment and to our legally binding climate goals”. Hayes said the absence of coordinated government policy was an “abolition of duty”.
他补充说：“目前唯一合理的解决方案是暂停数据中心项目，直到政府能够令人满意地回答一些最基本的问题：我们需要多少数据中心、用途是什么、建在哪里，以及如何避免污染。”
“The only sensible solution at this point is a moratorium on datacentres until very basic questions about how many we need, what for, where, and how pollution will be avoided are answered satisfactorily by the government,” he added.
政府此前已排除了对数据中心实施暂停的可能性，称此举会将投资和优质工作岗位转移到国外。而在苏格兰，议员们于9月投票决定，暂停所有新的数据中心规划申请长达一年，以便制定国家层面的战略。
The government has previously ruled out issuing a moratorium on datacentres, stating that doing so would send investment and good jobs abroad. In Scotland, MPs voted in September to pause all new datacentre planning applications for up to a year until a national strategy can be developed.
德拉克斯公司的一位发言人表示：“德拉克斯发电站潜在的数据中心项目既能支持英国经济增长，也有助于实现政府推动工业复兴的目标，尤其是在北约克郡等地区，同时也有助于实现人工智能主权。”
A Drax spokesperson said: “The potential plans for datacentres at Drax Power Station can support UK economic growth as well as helping meet the government’s ambitions for industrial renewal, in places like North Yorkshire, as well as AI sovereignty.
自然资源保护协会（NRDC）是一个长期反对生物质能运动的团体，对我们塞尔比项目没有任何积极愿景。他们的不实断言未经独立核实，且源于对生物质和生物能源温室气体核算国际标准以及数据中心潜在电力组合的基本错误认知。
“NRDC are a long-standing anti-biomass campaign group and have no positive vision for our Selby site. Their inaccurate assertions are not independently verified and are rooted in basic errors regarding the international standards for GHG accounting of biomass and bioenergy and on the potential datacentres’ power mix.”