The hyperscale data centres are coming. Should we welcome them?

Dear readers — hidden away, in a quiet corner of south east Leeds, diggers are busy preparing the ground for a massive investment by Microsoft. The software provider has already spent £106m acquiring the land, and will be investing much more in building three “hyperscale” data centres. Today’s piece, by freelancer Rose Mason, asks: is this a good thing?

As well as that, we have your regular round up, and some of the best things to do this weekend, featuring both pints and prints.

The round-up:

⚖️ Malcolm Phillips, 93, the former manager of Skircoat Lodge in Halifax, was deemed unfit to stand trial at Bradford Crown Court on Monday. He had been facing charges of rape, indecent assault and indecency with a child (BBC News). His assistant, Linda Brunning, 67, was found guilty of indecent assault and assisting Phillips’ abuse, and was sentenced to 25 years in prison. “Today's outcome cannot undo the harm suffered by those children at Skircoat Lodge, but it does represent long overdue accountability,” said Deputy Chief Inspector Claire Smith of West Yorkshire Police.

BBC News also revealed that an expert report had found that any child placed at Skircoat Lodge was “likely to suffer significant harm”. The children's care home was shut down in 1996, and 135 people have now made compensation claims over abuse.

🎸 Northern Guitars in Leeds has had its future secured after the property it’s based in was acquired by Music Venue Properties, a community benefit society set up to protect independent venues. The operators said: "This purchase protects a rare grassroots music venue in Leeds city centre and ensures local and touring artists will continue to have a stage for years to come."

🌧️ Recent wet weather getting you down? Try to look on the bright side — at least it's good for the reservoirs. In fact, while we don't want to jinx it, a hosepipe ban looks much less likely this year, with reservoir levels sitting at 87% at the end of May, compared to 63% at the same point last year.

😳 Warmer temperatures are returning at the weekend, but try not to get carried away in the heat and run naked through the streets of Wakefield. That’s what a man and a woman did on Monday, as reported by Yorkshire Live. Police were called to the scene, but were unable to catch the clothes-less couple.

The hyperscale data centres are coming. Should we welcome them?

By Rose Mason

When I arrive at the Skelton Grange industrial estate, dusk is setting in, and I can hear the fizz of electricity emanating from the nearby substation. It feels a bit like I’m trespassing, especially when a security guard initially says I can’t enter. But after a bit of a chat he relents, and lets me drive down the wide new road, to gaze upon the site of a former power station in all its glory.

I drive slowly, but not so slowly as to appear suspicious. The site, on the south eastern edge of Leeds, is nestled between three Amazon warehouses, the Enfinium waste facility (an incinerator that gets energy from waste) and the tranquil River Aire, along which the popular Transpennine way runs. Fresh dust from construction carpets the asphalt, and up ahead a generator powers a flood light. It catches diggers in its beam, churning the earth and piling it up into little mountains. They're preparing for the arrival of the data centres.

These will be, in a word, colossal. It's hard to describe them without falling back on the usual yardsticks: they will cover an area bigger than two football fields, and reach a height of eight double decker buses on top of each other. And that's just one of them. There will be three — each "hyperscale" in size — once Microsoft has finished the development.

The growth of data centres was ignored for many years, but more recently several communities have begun to object, and even take to the streets, against their arrival. So what will the Skelton Grange centres mean for Leeds? We looked at four areas: water, nature, power, and jobs.

Water