George Town Council planners have recommended approval of Firmus Technologies’ proposed AI data centre at Long Reach, near Bell Bay, ahead of a council vote on Tuesday.
The 288-megawatt facility would be built on the former Bell Bay Pulp Mill site, which is zoned General Industrial and sits between Williams Creek and Dirty Bay, with the Kanamaluka/Tamar Estuary to the west.
The proposal includes two data halls, a two-storey office building, a workshop, electrical substations, cooling equipment, 276 backup diesel generators, water storage tanks, 128 car parking spaces and stormwater infrastructure.
It would operate around the clock, seven days a week.
The planning application attracted 349 submissions and an e-petition with more than 5,000 signatures during a consultation period council extended by two weeks following significant community interest.
Submissions raised concerns about water and energy consumption, noise, air and light pollution, bushfire risk, impacts on wildlife, thermal pollution and chemical storage near the estuary.
“Many representations raise broader issues relating to energy policy, artificial intelligence, national security and Commonwealth regulation,” the planning report stated.
“These matters are either addressed through separate statutory frameworks or fall outside the scope of the planning authority’s role in determining the application.”
Planners found many concerns fell outside the Tasmanian Planning Scheme and were regulated under separate legislation.
The Environmental Protection Authority reviewed the application and determined it did not need to assess it, finding the risk of environmental harm was “very low or negligible”.
Recommended conditions include updated bushfire and emergency management plans, noise verification testing within 60 days of operations starting, a stormwater management plan, air quality verification and a public complaints register.
Planners recommended the backup generators be permitted to operate during power failures, for testing or in genuine emergencies, with simultaneous operation not to exceed 24 hours in any given year.
Greens science and information technology spokesperson Tabatha Badger said the conditions revealed basic shortcomings in the application.
“Already the community have serious issues trusting the information that they are getting out of Firmus,” she said.
“To see the fact picked up so late in the case that they didn’t have or they need to redo adequate sound assessments that are looking at actually the appropriate number of generators that are going to be in place, basic things like that that haven’t been done raise very serious concerns.”
Badger called on the state government to reveal where energy and water negotiations for the Bell Bay site were up to before the council decision.
“It’s not fair on the community or indeed the council that they are going into this huge decision. And we haven’t got clarity over the two greatest things that people are concerned about, which is energy and water,” she said.
She claimed Firmus’ three proposed AI facilities would consume up to 25% of the state’s power.
A parliamentary inquiry has been established to examine the expansion of AI and data facilities across the state, but Badger said it would not have answers in time for Tuesday’s vote.
The facility is one of three AI data centres Firmus is pursuing in Tasmania, alongside a site under construction at St Leonards and a proposed facility at Wesley Vale.
Firmus was contacted for comment.
