Anthropic signs deal for Australia data centre: Government

SYDNEY – Artificial intelligence start-up Anthropic signed a deal on Sept 16 for its first Australian data centre, the premier of Queensland state announced in Parliament.David Crisafulli said the company behind the Claude large-language model would set up in a new digital park expected to open in 2027.The data centre would deliver more jobs and electricity to the northern state, he added, seeking to ease community concern over a boom in AI data centre construction.“Earlier today, Anthropic signed an historic agreement for their first Australian data centre,” he said in Queensland’s Parliament on Sept 16.Anthropic could not immediately be reached for comment.Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said in August that his national government will seek to pass laws mandating national minimum standards for water and energy use by data centres, as well as rules to minimise their impact on communities by locating them away from homes, schools, prime farmland and potential housing sites.Plans for the Western Downs Digital Park, where Anthropic will lease a data centre, show four buildings, each with 36,000 sq m of data centre floor space.Its developers, Zerra DC, have said in planning documents that the project will not compete with the community for water because it will utilise primarily air-cooled technology.The planning documents say the Western Downs region is a major contributor to the generation of energy in Queensland and a surplus producer of energy.Crisafulli said the Anthropic deal would add energy to the grid and respect the community.Anthropic has lobbied Australian officials to change copyright laws to assist in training AI models, prompting a backlash from media companies, musicians and other creators. AFP