P3 Logistic Parks has taken over the former Großauheim barracks in Hanau, near Frankfurt, from the Bundesanstalt für Immobilienaufgaben (Institute for Federal Real Estate) to develop one of the largest data center campus in Europe.
P3 plans to develop a large-scale data center campus, the P3 Datacenter Hanau, on the 250,000m² site.
P3 said climate protection and energy efficiency are to play a central role in the design. The campus will be built and operated sustainably and supplied with 100 per cent green electricity.
The construction of the campus will take place in several phases, with at least eight data center modules on a building area of around 200,000m² to be built over a period of ten years. The project is a brownfield development. P3 shall decontaminate the Großauheim barracks site – which has been vacant since 2008 – carry out the deconstruction, recycle the current building stock and reuse the materials for ground works.
An electrical supply of 180 megawatts is planned for the data center campus. For sustainable operation, P3 has agreed sustainability goals with the city of Hanau and is committed to their implementation. P3 Datacenter Hanau will be completely supplied with electricity from renewable energy sources from the commissioning of the first module, onwards. In addition, special attention will be paid to energy efficiency and the balancing and reduction of CO2 emissions. For this purpose, data will be shared annually with the City and the consumption of all resources will be monitored via an energy management system.
To protect local flora and fauna, P3 is implementing a series of species protection measures. These include the establishment of compensation areas and the relocation of animals in need of protection. In addition, P3 is creating further suitable habitats, such as swift towers and bat roosts, and is greening the project area.
Soenke Kewitz, Managing Director P3 Logistic Parks Germany, says: “The e-commerce boom and increasing teleworking are making it ever more clear how important data centers are for us all. Without them, advancing digitalisation is not possible and the need to meet this demand with a green alternative is enormous. We are delighted to be able to develop this future-proof solution, the P3 Datacenter Hanau, in close cooperation with the city.”
Claus Kaminsky, Lord Mayor of the City of Hanau, says: “The development of the former Großauheim barracks into a data center campus that is also very large by international standards, represents for us the centerpiece of the implementation of our data center strategy. The joint development and binding definition of sustainability goals above the generally accepted level – for example, half of the energy will be fed from local renewable sources – was particularly important to us, also due to the size of the campus when construction is completed.”
The construction of a combined heat and power plant by Gemeinschaftskraftwerk Hanau GmbH & Co. KG is also planned on the campus. This will ensure a climate-friendly district heating supply for Hanau from 2024, after the supply contracts with the Staudinger power plant expire. A transformer station is also being built on the project site by the local grid operator, Hanau Netz GmbH.
Semir Selcukoglu, Head of Datacenter P3 Logistic Parks, says: “Our project in Hanau will be one of the largest data center campuses in Europe. The exciting question we have tackled is: how can we reconcile a large-scale data center with the challenges of climate change? I am particularly proud that we found a trend-setting solution in collaboration with the city of Hanau. I look forward with great anticipation to the development of this project, which is the size of 35 football pitches and will be powered entirely by green electricity. In addition, the project will have no negative impact on the land balance of the Rhine-Main area, as it is an already sealed area formerly used for military purposes.”
The development of the data center campus is speculative. The utilisation concept is designed for established data center operators as tenants. The city of Hanau is a particularly attractive location due to its proximity to the DE-CIX internet hub in Frankfurt.
