DataVita, Scotland's homegrown data centre operator and cloud provider, has submitted a planning application to North Lanarkshire Council for a new facility called DV4 at its Chapelhall campus, marking the next phase of a site the company has operated for more than a decade.

A Growing Campus in Scotland's First AI Growth Zone

The application for planning permission in principle covers a development that would require USD 1,145.68 million of construction investment over two years and deliver 2,650 construction job years along with 120 permanent skilled roles on site, with apprenticeships included. At least 40 percent of capital contracts are expected to be delivered by local suppliers.

The Chapelhall site forms part of the Lanarkshire AI Growth Zone, which the UK Government designated in January 2026 as the first such zone in Scotland. DataVita already owns and operates DV1 at Chapelhall, described as Scotland's largest purpose-built Tier III certified data centre, and is currently constructing DV3 on the same site.

The company also operates a second facility in Glasgow and is the largest supplier of cloud services to the Scottish public sector through the Scottish Government's Cloud and Hosting Services framework.

Danny Quinn, Managing Director of DataVita, placed the submission in the context of what he described as widespread speculation in the Scottish data centre market.

"We have seen a lot of data centre speculation in Scotland recently, and the vast majority of it will never be built," Quinn said. "DataVita has been operating in Scotland for more than ten years, and we already underpin a lot of the critical services used day in, day out across Scotland. We built DV1 at Chapelhall, we are building DV3, and we run them ourselves with a Scottish team. DV4 is the next stage of that campus."

Public Consultation Shapes the Design

Before submitting the application, DataVita held four public consultation events, exceeding the two required under the process. The company published all exhibition material online throughout the consultation period and issued a public FAQ that was updated after each event.

Feedback from residents has directly influenced the proposed design. The maximum building height has been reduced from 30 metres to 26 metres, operational plant has been relocated to the south of the building away from nearby homes, and around 1,000 metres of new native hedgerow will be planted, at least double the length being underway

A feasibility study is now underway for a community garden and greenhouse that would be warmed by surplus heat from the data centre, an idea raised by residents during the consultation events. The project would be funded through a community investment fund.

Designed Around Scotland's Green Data Centre Criteria

DataVita states that DV4 is designed to meet the four criteria the Scottish Government recommends for green data centres. The facility will run on 100 percent renewable electricity backed by certified Scottish generation, and its efficiency target is a power usage effectiveness below 1.25, which the company says is ahead of the recognised European benchmark for cool climates.

The cooling system is described as closed-loop and sealed, with no evaporative cooling. DataVita has set a watkilowatt-houret of 0.05 litres per kilowatt hour or lower.

The company offered a comparison to illustrate the scale: that figure equates to at most an egg cup of water for the equivalent of a washing machine cycle's worth of electricity, around a thousand times less water than the wash itself uses. In practice, the company states, the sealed system tops up less water in a year than one Scottish resident uses at home.

Heat recovery capability is built into the facility from day one. DataVita says it is in active discussions with the new Monklands Replacement Hospital and the neighbouring BioCity campus regarding the reuse of surplus heat generated by DV4.

Air Quality Assessment Goes Beyond Planning Requirements

The planning submission includes a detailed air quality assessment that DataVita says goes well beyond what is required at this stage of the application process.

The assessment models deliberately extreme scenarios, including every standby generator across DV1, DV3 and DV4 running simultaneously during a continuous 72-hour emergency.

The company notes that those conditions have never arisen in practice. In more than ten years of operation at Chapelhall, the campus has not experienced a single grid power cut, and DV1's standby generators have been required for a total of one hour of unplanned running across that entire decade, outside routine testing.

The generators planned for DV4 will run on renewable hydrotreated vegetable oil fuel with advanced emissions controls. The installation will operate under a permit from the Scottish Environment Protection Agency, which applies the best available techniques standard.

Technical Submissions Cover a Wide Range of Assessments

The planning application for DV4 is supported by a full suite of technical assessments. These cover energy and decarbonisation, noise, air quality, transport, flood risk and drainage, ecology and landscape, heritage, ground conditions, economic impact and construction environmental management.

DataVita said it chose to include these assessments at the planning permission in principle stage so that the council and the public can examine the full detail of the proposals from the outset.

Quinn encouraged community members to engage with the process. "The application is now with the council and open for comment, and I would encourage people to look at the details," he said.

He also used the occasion to argue for a broader rethinking of how data centres are perceived in Scotland. "Scotland has an opportunity not only to become a data centre location but also an exporter of intelligence via low-carbon data centres. We don't think of exporting barley when we talk about the success of our whisky industry, and data centres should be no different."

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