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London, Paris, Berlin: Europe-wide protests against data centers at the weekend
Civil society groups are calling for an immediate moratorium on large data centers in Europe. The “Stop Dirty Data Centers” initiative is planning protests and actions for November 6th and 7th. In the
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Civil society groups are calling for an immediate moratorium on large data centers in Europe. The “Stop Dirty Data Centers” initiative is planning protests and actions for November 6th and 7th. A demonstration against a planned data center will take place in the south of Berlin on Friday.
The “Stop Dirty Data Centers” initiative calls for an immediate moratorium on large data centers in Europe. She is planning protests and actions on site this Friday and Saturday. These take place simultaneously in at least nine capitals in Europe, including Berlin.
Behind the protests is a new initiative: “Stop Dirty Data Centers”. More than 100 groups from all over Europe are taking part. For the first time, there are simultaneous actions against data centers all over Europe.
The EU wants three times as many data centers
The protests come at a time when the European Union is pushing to expand its digital infrastructure. In April 2025, the EU Commission will have one for thishttps://commission.europa.eu/topics/competitiveness/ai-continent_en">AIContinent Action Planpresented. The goal: In five to seven years there should be at least three times as much data center capacity in the EU as there is today.
Civil society groups and local people are increasingly concerned about plans to fast-track these projects. In recent months, local and national initiatives have emerged around planned data center locations across Europe. You ask: What kind of digital technology do we need? Where should it be? And what does that mean for the environment?
Inspired by other countries
https://stopdirtydatacentres.eu/">“Stop dirty data centers”calls for a moratorium on large data centers because they would cause damage. "Data centers make life even more expensive for people across Europe. They make us dependent on large US tech companies and on oil, gas and coal. We are sacrificing democracy and our climate goals for this," says Michelle Thorne. She is strategy director at the Green Web Foundation and is helping to organize the protest in Berlin.
A moratorium is a legally authorized temporary interruption, suspension or delay of a particular activity. For example: No new data centers will be approved for a certain period of time. Or only again when certain rules are adhered to. For example, Singapore issued a moratorium on new data centers in 2019. The country only ended the break in 2022, and since then there have been stricter rules for new projects.
The protest against data centers has become a global phenomenon in recent yearshttps://www.dw.com/en/chilean-environmental-activists-block-construction...untilhttps://aapti.in/blog/communities-are-starting-to-protest-against-data-c....
People in the USA are also fighting back against data centers, with success. Since the beginning of 2025, local groups there have stopped or delayed many projects. Together they were worth more than 300 billion dollars (268 billion euros). This is shown by figures fromhttps://www.datacenterwatch.org/q1-2026">DataCenter watch, a project by the US company 10a Labs.
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Actions in Berlin
In Berlin, activists are planning on Friday at 1:00 p.mhttps://theleftberlin.com/event/protest-on-data-centre-open-day/">oneDemo in the Mariendorf districtagainst a data center planned there. The meeting point is at Lankwitzstrasse 45 in 12107 Berlin.
On Saturday there is under the namehttps://www.grueneliga.de/de/themen-projekte/rechenzentren/verkehrs-ge...“Network resistance – prevent data centers!”a nationwide conference in Berlin. Behind it are the environmental group Green League and the “Nodes of Resistance” initiative.
The AlgorithmWatch organization is also active. She has onehttps://algorithmwatch.org/de/klimaschutz-e-mail-aktion/">E‑Mail campaignstarted, which is also part of the protest program. AlgorithmWatch says: The hype about artificial intelligence is damaging the climate. The reason for the action: The Bundestag will soon be voting on a new energy efficiency lawhttps://netzpolitik.org/2026/ki-boom-wie-die-bundesregierung-die-regulie...Data center rulesvote.
Over the summer, AlgorithmWatch collected more than 160,000 signatures against these plans. MPs from the SPD, the Greens and the Left accepted the petition. The CDU/CSU did not want to accept it.
According to AlgorithmWatch and the Munich Environmental Institute, more than 20,000 people have now written an email to members of the SPD and CDU/CSU. Julian Bothe from AlgorithmWatch says: “The Union parliamentary group in particular wants to weaken the sustainability rules for data centers – even more than the federal government’s already bad draft law provides for.”
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