Israel caps data centres at 200MW after developers sought 27GW of grid connections
What's the deal? Israel's Electricity Authority published an outline on Sunday capping any new data centre at 200MW of power consumption, blocking the giant facilities developers had planned. The regulator will allocate 1,000MW for new large data centre connections, plus 300MW for government and defence needs.
Why now? Developers submitted connection requests to grid operator Noga totalling 27GW — about three times Israel's average consumption of roughly 9,000MW and above its installed generation capacity of 18,800MW. The Authority froze approvals in July 2026 while it drafted rules.
What changes in practice? A 200MW cap applies to about half of the roughly 100 requests submitted to Noga, blocking facilities such as Mega DC's planned 1,100MW site in Hadera. Developers must post guarantees of US$511.6K per megawatt requested, meaning a 100MW plan would cost US$51.2M held for one or two years.
The Authority will also require backup mechanisms so centres can be disconnected during extreme system load. The guarantees are designed to stop developers "squatting" on grid slots with low-feasibility applications and trading approvals.
What's the scale? A 200MW centre consumes electricity similar to a mid-sized Israeli city such as Rehovot or Holon, and costs more than US$1.02B to build. Together with about 2,000MW already approved, total allocated capacity reaches roughly 3,300MW — about 20% of Israel's expected 2030 consumption.
What happens next? The full decision will be published in the coming days for a three-week public hearing before taking effect. The Authority's plenum will consider objections before issuing the final binding framework.
The signal: The cap is an attempt to ration scarce power and screen projects, not reject AI infrastructure. The Authority says the allocation would make Israel one of the world's leaders in data centres as a share of national consumption — a bet on hosting AI compute without compromising supply security.
Read more: calcalistech.com, en.globes.co.il, calcalistech.com
