Project Atlas Data Centre Eastern Creek

I oppose the project of a huge data centre for a number of reasons.
Have indigenous stakeholders and groups consulted on this project and how it will impact country and waterways?
The data centres will have a huge impact on air pollution due to the huge amounts of fossil fuels that will be burnt to keep them running due to the huge amount of energy they require. Using that much energy (the equivalent of 25,000 homes and up to 100,000) will cause blackouts and increased cost of energy for residents. In a cost of living crisis. If blackouts were to occur, diesel generators would be used for the data centres - causing further noise and air pollution. If all proposed projects in Australia were to go ahead, their total maximum demand would be more than 21 GW – or more than seven times the capacity of Eraring, Australia’s biggest coal-fired power station. If data centre energy growth is matched with more gas, rather than renewables and storage, wholesale power prices will rise across Australia as high as 26% in NSW and 23% in Victoria by 2035.

The building of HUGE large scale data centres such as this 5billion dollar project will encourage and require more and more coal and gas operations to continue to upscale, rather than sourcing alternate power sources. This is ACCELERATING THE CLIMATE CRISIS.

The water consumption required to keep data centres cool is disgraceful given that Australia is in drought and in a water crisis already. We do not need data centres using up our water. This water demand will strain waterways and Sydney water systems. We are in a CLIMATE CRISIS. Our disaster costs associated with bushfires, floods and other natural disasters have increased 1000% since the bushfires in 2020.

Data centres also contribute to noise pollution, in Eastern Creek there are already a number of projects contributing to noise pollution. However, the noise pollution created by data centres will add to this 10 fold. The levels produced by a data centre can contribute to making it hard for residents to sleep and quietly enjoy their residence.

I strongly oppose all data centres being built in Eastern Creek when there is a desperate need for: social and community housing, social and community infrastructure, green spaces, habitat for native species (animals and plants) and alternate and green energy sources (solar), especially due to rising temperatures in Western Sydney.

From Climate Council:
Given what’s at stake, governments must move beyond voluntary signals to enforceable, nationally uniform requirements for data centres and their customers that:
Support additional renewable energy and firming capacity, and restrict use of offsets;
Maximise energy and water efficiency and avoid drawing on drinking water supplies;
Use flexible demand, backed by renewable solutions, to keep our energy system reliable and secure;
Pay for the energy and water infrastructure they need; and
Make current and future water consumption, and energy use and climate pollution transparent.

Citations:

https://www.wri.org/insights/us-data-center-growth-impacts
https://www.lincolninst.edu/publications/land-lines-magazine/articles/land-water-impacts-data-centers/
https://theconversation.com/5-ways-data-centers-endanger-their-local-communities-and-the-country-as-a-whole-282348
https://www.climatecouncil.org.au/resources/clouded-future-managing-the-risks-of-the-data-centre/

Data Centres increase the heat and noise level of the surrounding area 24/7 and require water or a-lot of electricity to self-cool. We have droughts and increasingly hot summers in this country and the residents of Eastern Creek and the surrounding suburbs do not deserve to be treated as if second to the data centre.
Reports have also been made about the impacts of data centres on nature, some farms even experiencing much higher numbers of stillbirths among their cattle.

We are fine without the data centre, residents will be worse-off with it. It is not worth it.

Ai is never and will never be a necessity worth destroying the land and using resources that we the people and the native wildlife need to survive on a planet that’s already being destroyed for billionaires’ enjoyment. Not to mention the lack of respect for First Nations people’s land that this is going to destroy. I doubt they’re option or input has been considered for this project. Anyone who would agree for this to go through is a heartless, soulless, and disgusting person who is lost to humanity. I have no empathy for any of the people behind this project.

I object to the proposal for the following reasons:-
a) There has been no assessment of urban heat island effects in this proposal. This should be mandatory and include heat transfer values (degrees) as well as mitigating measures taken.
b) Too many trees to be removed, for the purposes of maximising revenues of the developer
c) Air quality and noise impacts need to be more carefully scrutinised given the large scale of the development, cumulative impacts and the proximity to childcare centre with outdoor play and learning areas, and also the residential homes nearby
d) The diesel generator testing approximates 200 hrs or just below. This should require an EPL and to ignore the close proximity to limits, and exclude licensing and regulation requirements would be negligence by the EPA and NSW State Government.
e) the environmental impacts, loss of biodiversity via 24/7 electricity and greenhouse emissions cannot be quantified and more thorough assessment needs to take place
f) wastewater should be filtered and contained for inspection and testing for any PFAS or other chemicals which need to be treated before entering the Sydney Water sewage system, and possibly causing blockages
g) fire and bushfire risk needs to be fully addressed given the BCA report already shows non-compliance. For a project on such a large scale, this reflects poorly on Goodman in that the fire and building standards cannot be adhered even in the first architectural plans. This should be a red flag for NSW Govt for all other design, construction and operating considerations including ongoing compliance.
h) Residents of nearby roads, Burley Rd, Delaware Rd and the precinct surrounding these should have been consulted and if not, need to be consulted and this ensured by NSW Planning as it is State Significant and they reside within an 800metre radius. For a project of this scale, any business, home or learning organisation, needs to be advised and have a say.

I object to this proposal as there is no current regulatory framework in NSW which CONSISTENTLY assesses data centres in a responsible way.

Please refer to the attached objection to this project.

SUBMISSION OF OBJECTION
Development Application: Project Atlas Data Centre – 10 Roberts Road, Eastern Creek NSW
State Significant Development SSD-101067971

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1. Introduction

I write to formally object to the development application for the Project Atlas Data Centre at 10 Roberts Road, Eastern Creek. This proposal by Goodman Group for a 500MW data centre campus, comprising two three-storey buildings totalling 99,310 square metres with an estimated investment of up to $5 billion, represents a grave threat to Western Sydney's environment, water security, energy affordability, and community wellbeing.

The application must be rejected in its entirety.

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2. Unconscionable Water Consumption

Data centres are extremely water-intensive facilities, requiring vast quantities of water—predominantly drinking-quality water—for continuous cooling. Nationally, data centre water consumption is forecast to reach 112 billion litres in 2025, rising to 220 billion litres by 2030. In Sydney alone, data centres currently consume approximately 3.5 billion litres of drinking water annually, with Sydney Water preparing for that figure to jump to 25 per cent by 2035.

A single large data centre can consume up to 40 million litres of freshwater per day—equivalent to the daily usage of 80,000 households. Project Atlas, with its 500MW capacity, would sit at the extreme end of this spectrum. Goodman's own nearby Project Mars development is anticipated to use approximately 1.4 million litres of water per day. Project Atlas would dwarf this.

This is simply unconscionable in a country defined by drought, water scarcity, and climate volatility. Sydney's water supply is not infinite, and drinking water should not be squandered cooling servers for corporate profit.

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3. Crushing Energy Demand and Emissions

At 500 megawatts of capacity, Project Atlas would consume enough electricity to power approximately 780,000 homes. This is not a trivial addition to the grid—it is a fundamental reshaping of energy demand in NSW.

The Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) forecasts that data centres will consume 11% of NSW electricity by 2030. Data centre energy demand is projected to grow threefold by 2030, making their power use "equivalent to all Victorian homes." The Mamre Road data centre in Kemps Creek—approved nearby—would result in 1.3 million tonnes of CO2-equivalent emissions in 2032 alone.

Project Atlas is not "green" infrastructure. It represents a massive new drain on the electricity grid at precisely the moment when NSW is struggling to transition away from coal. The Climate Council warns that unchecked data centre growth risks a 26% wholesale electricity price rise in NSW and 14% more climate pollution from the main electricity grid by 2035.

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4. Cumulative Environmental Impacts

Project Atlas does not exist in isolation. Eastern Creek is rapidly becoming a data centre corridor. Existing facilities include:

· CDC Data Centres campus at 17 Roberts Road (adjacent to the Project Atlas site)
· NextDC S7 facility with 612MW capacity
· AirTrunk facilities in the area
· Multiple other data centres in various stages of approval and construction

The Western Sydney Regional Organisation of Councils has expressed serious concern about the cumulative and poorly understood impacts of heat generation, noise and emissions caused by the concentration of data centres, given that applications are assessed on their individual merits rather than collectively. This piecemeal approach to environmental assessment is dangerously inadequate.

Project Atlas would add to this growing burden, with cumulative effects on:

· Local temperatures from waste heat generation
· Air quality from diesel backup generators (340 generators proposed for the nearby NextDC facility alone)
· Noise pollution from continuous operations
· Stormwater and flooding impacts on Eastern Creek and the South Creek catchment

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5. Community Impacts

The 17-hectare site at 10 Roberts Road currently contains a vacant distribution centre. The proposal involves demolition of existing buildings and construction of massive data centre infrastructure.

Residents of Western Sydney have not been adequately consulted. Communities affected by data centre developments internationally have raised serious concerns about resource depletion, pollution, noise, property devaluation, and quality of life. These same concerns apply here.

The project would create minimal permanent local employment while consuming vast public resources—water, energy, and grid capacity—that could otherwise serve the community. This is a profoundly inequitable trade-off.

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6. Planning and Procedural Deficiencies

This application has been declared State Significant Development under the State Environmental Planning Policy Amendment (Data Storage) 2019. This designation effectively removes decision-making from local council control and diminishes community input.

The current status of the application is "Exhibition"—a public consultation period. However, meaningful community engagement has not occurred. The complexity of the proposal, the technical nature of the environmental assessments, and the speed of the approval pathway all work against genuine public participation.

Furthermore, the assessment process examines this project in isolation, ignoring the cumulative impact of the data centre concentration in Eastern Creek. This is a fundamental flaw that must be remedied.

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7. Recommendations

For the above reasons, I respectfully request that the NSW Department of Planning, Housing and Infrastructure:

1. Reject the Project Atlas development application in its current form.
2. Require a comprehensive cumulative impact assessment for all data centre developments in the Eastern Creek corridor before any further approvals are granted.
3. Mandate that any future data centre development:
· Use recycled or non-potable water exclusively for cooling
· Match 100% of load with additional renewable energy generation
· Fully disclose all energy and water consumption, emissions, and services delivered
· Undergo independent human health and environmental impact assessments
4. Remove State Significant Development status for data centres, returning decision-making to local councils and communities.
5. Impose a moratorium on new data centre developments in Western Sydney until comprehensive safeguards are legislated.

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8. Conclusion

Project Atlas is not a benign infrastructure project. It is a $5 billion corporate asset that would consume drinking water on an industrial scale, draw electricity equivalent to hundreds of thousands of homes, generate significant emissions, and contribute to the cumulative degradation of Western Sydney's environment—all while creating minimal local benefit.

Goodman Group is a global corporation seeking to maximise its returns. It is not acting in the public interest. The NSW Government must not facilitate this extraction of public resources for private profit.

I urge the Department to reject this application and to fundamentally rethink the approach to data centre development in NSW.

No Australian Citizen wants Ai Data Centres it is clear this is only to benefit Tech Billionaires & Epstein Class Zionist Genocidal Surveillance infultration by Palantir & other such Transnational corporations that Mossad Minns & ALP, LNP, ON can use to censor & punish protesters.

Date: 6 July 2026

This project will significantly impact the wildlife around the area as well as contaminating the water. Also a big health risk to local residents because of the radiation exposure.

absolutely not, data centres are a threat to all the surrounding wild life and a distgusting was tof power and water.

Re: Project Atlas, Eastern Creek Data Centre proposal (SSD-101067971)

I object to this proposal.

Having reviewed and researched quite a number of data centre projects across the Sydney basin and beyond, I could comment at great length at the discrepancies and conflicts across the Environmental Impact State (EIS) and its supporting documents. In this instance, I will leave it up to NSW Department of Planning, Housing and Infrastructure (DPHI) to fully dissect these errors and misstatements – and ensure Goodman Group furnishes the DPHI with greater granularity and accuracy across these documents before any decision is delivered.

I also note that two parliamentary inquiries are being conducted into data centres. One being at the NSW state government level with a second conducted federally. This is running alongside the finalisation of “principals” by both parliaments, although these appear to be more “vibe” like in approach with zero regulatory oversight and no authority with the teeth to ensure rules are met.
Further, with the latter driving an incessant rush of proposals through the NSW DPHI, the community is once again left with documents that have numerous errors, omissions and sleights of hand in how this particular project will be developed. Given Goodman’s track record of receiving approval then increasing the size and scope (e.g., Project Duke – SSD-71368959 – whereby 90MW became 120MW. They also increased Project Apollo during the approval process from 90MW in the initial SEARS to 135MW in the EIS), will this also transpire in the same manner? With the broader NSW community being treated with contempt by the lack of transparency from these various proponents, any social licence has been completely lost. It is incumbent upon the DPHI to hold these proponents of hyperscale data centres to a higher standard and rebuild some semblance of trust in the process.

One final comment before I give more detail on my key area of concern is around the registered environmental assessment practitioner (REAP) process. Once again, the group that prepares the EIS is also signing off as being the provider of an “independent quality assurance review”. A review that is supposed to ensure certain standards in relation to its completeness, accuracy, quality and clarity. I strongly urge the DPHI to change this policy! A REAP should provide a truly independent review that is at arm’s length to any organisation involved in delivering the EIS.

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In terms of my specific objection to this proposal, I wish to draw attention to the statements around the requirement for an Environment Protection Licence (EPL) from the NSW Environment Protection Authority.

At various points in the documentation the proponent states that an EPL is needed as under the “chemical storage” clause as it is a scheduled activity (both diesel and lithium ion batteries storage requirements are well beyond limits). However, in the following section under “electricity generation” it is considered a non-scheduled activity due to diesel generators being operated for less than 200 hours per annum.

My immediate question is “does this proposal require an EPL?” as the EIS is not exactly transparent. If an EPL is required, does it only pertain to the storage of petroleum products and batteries? Does it only include monitoring of how this storage is undertaken? Or does it include usage rates (back up generation and / or evaporation) and movement to the site via road tankers? The second question is whether the EPL also includes the external monitoring of diesel generation (such as hours and rates of usage) and associated emissions? Or does the EPL purely relate to storage?

In the interests of the community, the EPL should cover all activities related to onsite diesel – from shipment in and storage to actual usage. The latter would provide real insight into Project Atlas’ diesel generation. From the commissioning phase where such generators can take as many as 60 hours in total to calibrate (see data from overseas for examples) to ongoing testing requirements, such monitoring will clearly show whether generation exceeds the levels the proponent states in the EIS.

Furthermore, these testing levels for 249 generators remarkably fall just below the threshold for an EPL requirement under electricity generation (200 hours per annum). How is this remotely possible for a 500MW proposal when Goodman Group in its other data centre proposals always falls just under this 200 hours/annum threshold (whether it is 90MW, 120MW, 135MW)? Even more extraordinary is that all other large hyperscale data centre operators (e.g., Kemps Creek with 800 plus generators) magically fall below the 200hr/yr level. The conjuror’s trick for this Goodman proposal is treating five generators as one – even though the emissions will be FIVE times as much. With such reasoning, you could find a future proposal counting all generators as a single grouping and then it will only be a few hours per year.

To be honest this is a complete joke – and again, treats the NSW community with disdain. NSW DPHI needs to step in and work with the EPA to ensure transparency, clarity, honesty and consistency across all hyperscale data centre proposals.

The NSW public deserves clean air! The public also wants to be confident that data centres are being closely monitored – whether it is diesel emissions, noise exceedances, etc., with real mitigation requirements in place.

I support the project

Its great to see tech investment in Western Sydney, i strongly support this especially for the fact it will help in future proofing our local economy and job market.

Please refer to the attached documents.

DataCentres consume enormous amounts of water and electricity and it disrupts the urban areas

I strongly oppose the building of a data centre due the devastating environmental impacts of its operation.

No data centers. Treat them like a power station. They're not great for water or air quality. They polute drinkng water and will take all the electricity from the suburbs and make everyones electricity bills more expensive. Who even used ai anyway? It's not worth it for anyone.

Data centres are well known to use significant amounts of water for cooling purposes, stripping this essential resource from the community (Yu Tao 2025,doi 10.1016/j.eehl.2025.100157). They generate noise and sound pollution, and "heat islands" (Marinoni 2026, doi 10.48550/arXiv.2603.20897). These factors are extremely influential on locals and native wildlife. We are seeing the negative influences of data centres opening in the US, and we have the opportunity to avoid these impacts. Although data centres can create new jobs, there are better ways to do this, such as investing in clean energy projects and supporting local businesses. Data centres are being built to support new AI developments - features that no one asked for and are actively making us dumber. Data centres in our community will have a huge negative impact on day-to-day life, as well as the extreme negative environmental effects. In a country with crippling droughts, historic heat waves, devastating bush fires, and precious wildlife rapidly going extinct, why would we knowingly intensify these issues whilst making the younger generations less intelligent?

I believe the data centre in a highly populated area will pollute the environment, push up water and electricity prices.

I object to the proposed data centre due to concerns about increased traffic, noise, visual impact, and the potential strain on local infrastructure. The application does not adequately demonstrate how these impacts will be managed or mitigated. I ask that the consent authority carefully consider these issues and refuse the application unless it can be be shown that the development will not adversely affect the surrounding community.

We do not need more data centers in this country. We do not need its environmental and economic impacts on our communities.