Malaysia is expected to open many data center buildings in the near future, and part of the public's concern is about the high water consumption to cool the server computers.
Recently, Deputy Minister of Energy Transition and Water Transformation, Akmal Nasrullah Mohd Nasir has said that the cost of upgrading the electricity and water supply sources that need to be done to accommodate this new usage capacity will be fully borne by the infrastructure development companies, and will not be passed on to ordinary users.
He was asked by Senator Datuk Rosni Sohar about the impact of data center development on electricity and water consumption and if it will have a detrimental effect on Malaysians.
According to Akmal Nasrullah, an agreement for the supply of 7000MW of electricity between data center operators and Tenaga Nasional Berhad has been reached, and the government has set the Ultra High Voltage (UHV) tariff category for data centers that use electricity at very high rates.
In addition, he also said that for data centers that require cooling systems that require a lot of water consumption, data center operators are also working with water suppliers to implement a sustainable water supply management system to prevent data center needs from disrupting consumer water supply sources.
In fact, specific water tariffs for data centers have also been set under the National Sustainable Data Center Framework and the National Water Services Commission (SPAN) and must be followed starting September 1, 2025, from the data center development phase until it is operational to process data.