For more than six decades, a paper mill in central Finland helped satisfy the world's appetite for printed information. When its closure was announced in 2020, Kaipola seemed destined to become another relic of Europe's industrial past. Six years later, the site is attracting interest from an industry with an altogether different appetite: artificial intelligence. Its value lies less in the buildings left behind than in the electricity and water infrastructure that kept the paper rolling.
French AI infrastructure firm Sesterce plans to invest more than €10bn (about £8.5bn) in a computing campus at the former mill, starting with 200MW of capacity. The site purchase and permits are still unresolved, but the proposal reflects a wider shift. As developers scramble for power and land, Europe's shuttered industrial sites are acquiring new appeal.
The grid advantage
Securing land can be easier than securing electricity. The International Energy Agency estimates grid constraints could delay about a fifth of planned global data-centre capacity through 2030. Former industrial sites can offer substations, cooling systems and transport links. But these assets may not meet a data centre's requirements.
“An industrial site is not automatically suitable for a data centre,” cautions Alex de Vries-Gao, founder of Digiconomist, who adds that adapting power and cooling systems can require significant new investment and construction.
At Kaipola, two 110kV power lines serve the site. Distributor Elenia says they could support Sesterce's initial phase, although Finland's transmission operator must determine available capacity. There is a precedent in Hamina, where Google converted another Finnish paper mill into a data centre in 2011 and reused its seawater-cooling infrastructure. In northern France, Data4 plans a €5bn (about £4.2bn) campus on former steelworks land, but with new buildings.
The cost of regeneration
Reusing infrastructure cannot erase the electricity demand of a new data centre. At its proposed eventual capacity of 600MW, Sesterce's campus could consume around 5.3TWh a year if running continuously at full load. That is more than 6% of Finland's electricity consumption in 2025. Sesterce promises to enable a megawatt of new renewable generating capacity for each megawatt the campus draws within 10 years of opening. That is a capacity pledge, not a guarantee of equivalent electricity generation.
“The fundamental problem is that additional electricity demand materialises as soon as a data centre becomes operational," says de Vries-Gao, "while promised renewable energy projects may take years to materialise, if they materialise at all."
Kaipola's commercial future is also uncertain. Finnish broadcaster Yle reported that Sesterce has signed a contract with an unnamed customer but has not identified the project's financial backers. Negotiations to buy the site were still ongoing. Sesterce forecasts 2,000 construction jobs and 300 permanent posts. The mill's closure affected 448 positions, including transfers. The figures are not directly comparable, but they raise questions about the jobs such projects replace and create.
Not every proposed data centre can claim to regenerate derelict land. In late September, near Milan, officials in Cologno Monzese rejected an 80MW proposal on a site they said did not qualify for regeneration. Electricity and water use also weighed against it.
Back in Jämsä, town manager Jori Reijula urged patience. “There are still many permit processes, and many things need to fall into place,” he told Yle. Kaipola's old power lines may be ready for another industrial life. The town is still waiting to see what comes with them.
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