Major data centre plans for £400m GCRE project

THE planned £400m Global Centre of Rail Excellence (GCRE), which would deliver the world's first integrated train and rail infrastructure testing facility, has launched a competition to secure an energy and data centre partner which could see a multi-billion-pound investment

- SION BARRY

How the Global Centre of Rail Excellence could look

The Welsh Government scheme, which is being delivered via its standalone but wholly owned business GCRE Ltd, is earmarked for a 700-hectare site spanning the former Nant Helen opencast mine and Onllwyn Washery at Onllwyn in the Dulais Valley.

The data centre investment is not dependent on the testing facility being built and would occupy around 70 hectares of the site.

Formal requests for proposals are now being sought by GCRE on the back of strong early-stage interest, including from developers who would then secure a data centre operator.

Prior to the now-live competition, the number of interested parties was in double figures, which included one unsolicited offer for the land site. There is potential for data centres with capacity for several hundred megawatts (MW) at the site.

There is increasing data centre investment in Wales, including from US data centre venture Vantage, which has an expanding facility in Cardiff, as well as plans for new data centre sites at the former Ford engine plant in Bridgend and at the Welsh Government Bro Tathan business park in the Vale of Glamorgan.

For the rail facility, GCRE Ltd has secured £50m from the Cardiff Bay administration and £20m from the UK Government, originally signed off by the former Conservative Westminster administration.

This leaves it needing to raise around £330m.

Initial fundraising activities, conducted through a public procurement exercise, focused on securing equity investment. While the process was narrowed down to three potential institutional investors, including those in the US and the Middle East, a deal could not be secured.

It then looked to strike a funding deal with a long-term debt provider, but, again, a deal couldn't get over the line.