Japanese firm wants to spend more than a year in Provence
A public inquiry has been opened into Telehouse’s plan to build a data center in the south of France.
The project is planned for a vacant plot at the Sybilles business park in Les Pennes-Mirabeau, a commune located near Marseille in the Bouches-du-Rhône department of the Provence region.
The eight-building campus would be set on a six-hectare site, according to local media reports. DCD has previously reported that the company intends to build a 60,000 sqm (645,835 sq ft), 50MW facility in Bouches-du-Rhône, and hopes it will be up and running by 2027.
Michel Amiel, the mayor of Pennes-Mirabeau, is backing the project, but residents who spoke to news outlet Ici Provence were less convinced. "Digital pollution, noise pollution, visual pollution. For us, it's a disaster for the Pennes-Mirabeau," said one resident, referred to only as Romain.
The inquiry commenced on Monday, and will run until December 22. Two public meetings about the project have been scheduled for October 1 and December 10, and residents can have their say online.
Established in 1988 and owned by Japanese telco KDDI, Telehouse has operations in 15 cities globally, including in the US, UK, France, Germany, China, Singapore, Vietnam, and Japan.
In France, the firm operates the 7,000 sqm (75,347 sq ft) Telehouse Paris Voltaire site.
It has also been investing in its Magnay 2 development in the French capital. First announced in October 2022 and launched a year later, this will consist of five data halls at full build-out, offering 18MW across 12,000 sqm of IT space. The campus is a former EADS military site.
The latest phase, a 3MW expansion, opened in May.
Marseille is France’s second-largest data center market, and is dominated by Digital Realty, which has six sites around the city in operation or under development.
Source: DCD
