Amazon Web Services says existing state-level permits prevent it from switching its Australian data centres’ backup generators to renewable diesel, a step it has begun at sites in Europe and on the US west coast. In a submission to the Senate Environment and Communications References Committee’s inquiry into AI and data centres, AWS said it started moving to hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) in 2023 where such fuels are reasonably priced and reliably available.
It said a reliable, diverse local supply chain does not yet exist in Australia to support HVO use in all circumstances, and that domestic demand from the data centre sector alone is not enough to stimulate local production at scale.
AWS claimed HVO can cut lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions by up to 90 percent compared with fossil diesel. It said its Australian backup generators are not used for primary generation, and that it is prohibited from doing so under its development approvals. They are run mostly for brief…
https://w.media/aws-says-state-permits-block-renewable-diesel-for-backup-generators/
