“This is a bonkers proposal for a vast, energy-guzzling, water-wasting AI data centre covering hundreds of acres of land that’s totally unnecessary.”

Like so many of our readers, we were horrified to hear of plans for a massive data centre in the North Devon countryside. Anyone who follows environmental and human rights campaigners in North America will know that data centres are responsible for appalling effects on the environment and people’s lives. But many will not. So here goes:

There’s the water usage. In a climate crisis.

Compromised pressure and drinking water quality:

The power they consume:

The noise:

And this is without mentioning the devastation of a natural environment and the impact of a construction project and its carbon footprint in the middle of a climate and nature emergency.

And who is behind the proposal to buid one of these monsters at Great Torrington? Guy Shrubsole, environmental campaigner and author, has done the research. I’ll hand over to him:

Devonians were horrified to learn last week of plans for a massive AI data centre near Great Torrington, north Devon. The proposals from company XLinks Ltd would cover 850 acres of farmland. But who owns the land? I decided to investigate.

The developer XLinks has published a map of where its proposed AI data centre & supporting battery storage site would be sited, on a website here: www.devondatacampus.com It states that “the site is made up of land from several local landowners”.

To investigate, I first used Land Explorer, a great online tool that displays Land Registry data on corporate land ownership in a map format: landexplorer.coop If the land parcels are corporate-owned, they’re shaded purple and you can find out the owners. These weren’t: they’re owned by individuals.

In fact, some of the land earmarked for XLinks’ massive data centre is ‘unregistered’ with the Land Registry – meaning finding out who owns it is even harder. As you can see the land in the centre of the proposed data centre is blank, as is the battery storage facility – no registered owners.

Buying details of land parcels is expensive – £7 per land parcel. So first I had a quick check of other proxy data sources E.g. I checked Devon Council’s Highway Act s31 Landowner Deposits. But this turned up nothing, just that woods to the north of the site are owned by Clinton Devon Estates.

None of this was definitive. So I decided to pay my £7 and buy Land Registry documents for the largest of the land parcels, covering Furze Farm. It’s owned by a farming family who live locally – no surprises there. But what was surprising was one of the clauses in the land title register…

Buried in the land title register document is a ‘Unilateral Notice’ restricting any sale of the land earmarked for the Great Torrington AI data centre. The agreement was made on *23rd July 2025* between the farming family who currently own the land, and… Stratus Data Developments Ltd.

So, what are Stratus Data Developments Ltd? Well, if you look them up on Companies House, and check out the ‘Person of Significant Control’, you’ll find that it’s… XLinks Limited. In other words, the company proposing the AI data centre already have an agreement to purchase the land.

We don’t know the full details of the agreement between XLinks Limited and the current owners of this farmland. But the company made a deal with them a *year* before going public with the plans. This is, unfortunately, how developers & landowners operate: the public are the last to know.

Incidentally, the forthcoming ‘consultation’ on the Great Torrington AI data centre isn’t one being run by the council – there’s still no formal planning application. The consultation is being run by the company themselves, via a corporate consultancy, SEC Newgate (www.secnewgate.co.uk)

Anyone wishing to participate in the company’s consultation may wish to ask XLinks and SEC Newgate what they will be doing with any information submitted, whether all objections will be published, data compliance etc.

I’ve not shelled out £7 for each and every one of the land parcels that make up the proposed AI data centre site. Others are welcome to do so! I suspect they will contain similar Unilateral Notices and agreements.

I was also intrigued why XLinks Ltd had such an interest in this North Devon site. Why propose an AI data centre here? The answer seems to lie in a previous failed project of theirs, the Morrocco-UK Power Project, which the UK Govt declined to fund in June 2025: xlinks.co/morocco-uk-p…

XLinks’ Morocco-UK Power Project had proposed bringing high voltage power cables from Morocco to the Alverdiscott 400kV substation in… North Devon

The Alverdiscott substation is not far north of Great Torrington, as you can see from the map below. And XLinks claim in their massive AI data centre proposal that the proximity of the Alverdiscott substation is an important factor for siting the data centre.

So it seems that shortly after the UK Govt refused to fund their Morocco-UK power project in June 2025, XLinks went out scouting for land in the same area of North Devon & signed agreements with landowners in July 2025 for a proposed AI Data Centre A year later, the public hear about it.

And this is Guy’s message to us all:

“This is a bonkers proposal for a vast, energy-guzzling, water-wasting AI data centre covering hundreds of acres of land that’s totally unnecessary. The way that the company signed agreements with existing landowners for purchase of the land, a year before making the proposals public, shows their contempt for listening to local people. I hope Devonians mobilise en masse to reject this AI data centre – not just through the planning process but also by signing petitions, contacting MPs and councillors, and holding protests.”

Please get in touch editor@westcountryvoices.co.uk if you have further information or want to publicise events to counter this hideous proposal.