Amazon Web Services is encountering grid connection wait times of up to seven years for new European data center projects, a delay that exceeds the usual finance and physical construction timelines by quite some margin.
This is according to Amazon’s head of energy markets and regulation for AWS EMEA, Pamela McDougall, who, in an interview with Reuters, said that timelines for getting a grid connection have become one of the biggest deciding factors in Amazon’s data center investments. "And we're finding more and more across Europe that certainty of the delivery date has continued to be delayed," she said during the interview.
Grid queues into the 2030s
McDougall says that AWS typically develops a data center in roughly two years, with connection queues in the U.S. averaging one to three years, as per the International Energy Agency, but these can sometimes stretch to seven years. Europe faces similar timelines, with long grid connection queues hampered by seven-year waits that will potentially stretch into the early 2030s for projects just now breaking ground.
In Italy and Spain, even projects with land and permits in place are unable to secure firm delivery dates for grid connections, effectively freezing new capacity irrespective of demand, though it’s understood that Amazon continues to expand its data center across Europe, with ongoing expansion efforts in countries including France and Germany
Data center power demand has risen sharply over the past three years, driven by the likes of AI infrastructure and the higher rack densities it requires. Facilities that were once designed around 6 to 12 kilowatts per rack are now being planned around loads several times higher, with AI clusters introducing large, concentrated demand blocks that must be provisioned upfront by grids that were designed to accommodate predictable industrial and commercial loads.
The International Energy Agency has warned that procurement timelines for core grid components now routinely extend beyond two years for cables and up to four years for large power transformers. Even when regulatory approval moves quickly, actual, physical delivery might not follow until years later. This disconnect between construction timelines and grid expansion timelines has left transmission operators unable to respond at the pace hyperscalers like Amazon need to bring their new facilities online in a timely fashion.
Meanwhile, Europe’s data center electricity consumption continues to grow exponentially. Estimates by the European Commission place EU data center demand at roughly 96 TWh in 2024, with projections rising to 168 TWh by 2030. That growth is heavily front-loaded in AI-capable facilities, which concentrate power demand in ways traditional grid planning models don’t handle well.
Speculative capacity bottlenecks
The most severe bottlenecks can be found in nations like Italy, where grid operators have received tens of gigawatts’ worth of connection requests tied to speculative or early-stage data center projects. Similar patterns have been observed in Spain and parts of Northern Europe, with capacity being reserved several years in advance and without any sort of policing or enforcement against companies that sit on secured capacity without then proceeding to define or achieve construction milestones.
This capacity squatting creates a situation where grid capacity exists on paper but is, for all intents and purposes, unavailable. Projects that are ready to build are forced to wait behind projects that may never materialize, turning access to the grid into a race of who can get to it first, versus whose projects are actually ready to get moving.
In the United Kingdom, efforts are underway to reform this system, with energy regulator Ofgem moving away from strict first-come-first-served allocation toward a “first-ready” model that prioritizes projects with land, financing, and permits in place. It’s understood that similar reforms are being discussed in Italy and Spain, but bureaucracy is slow, and existing queues will take years to unwind.
No short-term solution
All of this is influencing where hyperscalers are willing to invest. Reuters, citing analysis from energy think tank Ember, has warned that poor grid planning could push Europe’s data centers away from established hubs like Frankfurt, London, Amsterdam, and Paris, where waiting times are the longest.
Italy, meanwhile, is an interesting case study in both opportunity and risk. It offers available capacity on paper, but in practice, it has been hampered by surges in connection requests that have overwhelmed planning processes, leaving even well-funded projects uncertain about timelines. We’re also seeing similar dynamics emerging in Southern and Eastern Europe as hyperscalers explore secondary markets like Greece (Microsoft) and Poland (Google) to escape congestion in traditional hubs.
Amazon is responding by exerting its influence in energy policy discussions and by backing initiatives aimed at accelerating grid investment. The company, along with Google and Meta, is a founding member of the Green Industrial Grids Association (GIGA), which is lobbying for faster permitting and coordinated transmission planning. In parallel, large cloud providers are exploring ways to reduce grid dependence, including on-site generation and investments in capacity such as nuclear.
Ultimately, grid access is dictating where and when new capacity gets built in Europe. Projects that can secure a firm connection date move forward, while others stall regardless of demand. In markets with long and poorly enforced queues, this has inevitably turned grid capacity into a scarce, front-loaded resource.
Efforts to reform this and accelerate grid investment are underway, but they’re competing with years of accumulated backlog and long lead times for equipment. Until those frictions ease, European data center expansions will continue to be throttled by power delivery.
Update 02/11/2025 9:37am PT: Article and headline amended to clarify grid delays.
Luke James is a freelance writer and journalist. Although his background is in legal, he has a personal interest in all things tech, especially hardware and microelectronics, and anything regulatory.
