NOTE: In this blog Firmus’ Wesley Vale date centre is being used as the case as it’s being built an hour from Burnie and the Latrobe Council, and its residence are being very vocal about it. Firmus are building 2 other data centres across Tasmania, however there are 8 or more others in the pipeline from other companies.
In fairness to Firmus – their playing by our rules. It’s just that our rules are outdated.
That’s right, Firmus might be acting dodgy but it’s actually the Tasmanian Planning Scheme (from 1993) and our State Government (who thinks 1993 is a-okay) that are the problems.
Why can’t Local Councils stop them?
In 1993 when we last updated the Tasmanian Planning Scheme, it was generally thought that Local Councils control the land zoning, and as long as the land use matched the zoning, that’s okay. So, if a Local Council doesn’t want an industrial building in the heart of the CBD, they don’t zone that area as Industrial. It was a simple plan to match simpler times.
Using that framing, a data centre is a private industrial building on private industrial land doing private industrial things. If the Local Council says “no because we don’t like it” then they are open to being sued by the company.
Which in the context of Burnie City Council and a hypothetical Firmus data centre, it’s Burnie’s $45 Million getting sued by Firmus’ $33 Billion (that’s 733 times bigger). Yeah…
What’s Firmus doing?
Nothing illegal. Honestly, they are playing The Game, and they’re playing it very well!
They’ve found holes and limits in the planning scheme, and using them to their advantage:
Don’t want public scrutiny: call it Research and Development. The Tasmanian Planning Scheme includes a ‘technology’ allowance for industrial land (remember, in 1993 a computer was as big as a house and like 9 companies in the world had one).
Don’t want State level planning: split projects into little work packages. By packaging their work to fit under Local Council approval, which is easier, they miss being assessed at a State level. To go higher requires some conditions to be met, and importantly it needs the State Minister for Planning to agree (he doesn’t).
Need to clear land before approvals: that’s land management and weed control. It’s a genuine thing and not doing it gets you in trouble with Local Council and possibly the Environment Protection Authority.
Locals worried about power prices: imply you’ll build 2x what you need in renewable energy in Tasmania. Firmus agreed to add renewables to the National Energy Market. ‘National’ is the key word, and with Marinus link on its way they can still be ‘green’ regardless of where the power is generated.
Need some Social Benefit:give a truck load of money to sports teams. Yes, Social Benefit can be bought by funding and sponsoring State level sports teams (including the new AFL team that comes with the stadium we cannot afford). Mix in 500+ jobs during construction and 175 ongoing, and it starts sounding really beneficial without actually benefitting those around the data centres.
What needs to change:
Yesterday (14th Oct 2026) the Tasmanian Premier released a statement around ensuring local communities near data centres benefit from them (full release: https://www.premier.tas.gov.au/latest-news/2026/october/major-ai-investment-must-deliver-for-tasmanian-communities). In my opinion his plan is useless. It boils down to “we’ve set up the Local Community Benefit Fund to allow industrial developers to buy more social benefit without defining what the benefits will be”. And “we’ve made some expectation they should follow that aren’t legally required or enforceable”.
The expectations the Premier announced includes investing in renewable energy, protecting Tasmanians’ access to power and water, don’t increase the price of power and water to Tasmanians, build data centres on industrial areas, and few others. Again, these aren’t legally enforceable so who’s cares.
And worst of all it kept mentioning “major AI and data-centre proponents”. Major. Which is exactly what Local Councils have been asking these projects to be classified as.
Currently data centres are classified as Utilities because it’s the closest 1993 category due to telecommunication (internet), not producing anything physical, and providing a 24/7 service with very few staff…. Just like a power station or a phone exchange.
Until it’s updated, Local Council needs to request the State to elevate these to major projects and have the Minister for Planning accept it. If accepted, it would bring increased scrutiny and restrictions. If not accepted, Local Councils are forced to approve them with very few restrictions.
How Do We Make Change:
Running for Deputy Mayor and Councillor for Burnie City Council is my first time doing anything political, and I’ve learnt a lot about how to get the State Government to listen.
In short, the public and Local Councils cannot directly engage with the Tasmanian Parliament. Everything needs to be sponsored and presented by a Member of the House of Assembly or the Legislative Council.
The real path to change if probably the simplest: a petition.
Anyone can raise a petition and there is no minimum number of signatures needed. It does need a Member to sponsor it, and to vet the petition (i.e. how many signatures) before being presented to the Tasmanian Parliament.
This is what I think Councils should be doing more of, especially if all 29 across the state can work together to gather signatures from their individual residents. For something like updating the Tasmanian Planning Scheme to get a spotlight in Parliament, it would need a lot of signatures, around 20,000 to 30,000.
That’s a lot for one Council, but for 29 Councils…. It’s just over 1000 signatures each. And Burnie City Council, which is middle of the road population wise, has just over 15,000 registered voters. So, if all the Local Councils worked together and each publicised and actively collected signatures, we could bring this issue front and centre to the State Government.