AirTrunk drops 140MW Mars Road data centre in Lane Cove West

At a glance

• A 140MW data centre AirTrunk planned next to its SYD2 campus in Lane Cove West will not go ahead, Capital Brief reported on 6 November 2026.

• The site was not technically suitable, the company said, and its focus is shifting to bigger projects away from metropolitan areas.

• Work continues on SYD2, designed for more than 180MW, and on the approved Apollo Place development next door.

• No environmental impact statement will be lodged for Mars Road, which received its study requirements from the NSW planning department in April.

• In the Hunter, the 550.5MW Kurri Kurri campus is on public exhibition until 11 November.

AirTrunk will not go ahead with a 140MW data centre it had planned next to its SYD2 campus in Lane Cove West, Capital Brief reported on 6 November.

The site was not technically suitable, the company said, and it is shifting to bigger projects away from metropolitan areas. "We will not proceed with the proposal, so there will be no EIS or community consultation for that site," AirTrunk said in a statement to local outlet In the Cove.

The proposal covered four lots at 3-4 Apollo Place and 87-91 Mars Road, in the Lane Cove West business park on Sydney's lower north shore. It took in part of the 1 Sirius Road lot where SYD2 stands, to be cut out by a boundary adjustment before the environmental impact statement was lodged. Planning consultant Willowtree Planning asked the NSW planning department for the project's study requirements on 6 March. Its request described a five-storey building with about 140MW of IT load.

The department issued those requirements, known as SEARs, on 9 April. On 31 August it added a requirement that the study address the NSW Data Centre Guidelines released that month.

Construction continues at SYD2 and Apollo Place

SYD2, at 1 Sirius Road, opened in 2021. It is designed for more than 180MW across 24 data halls at full build-out, according to AirTrunk. The NSW planning department approved the campus in November 2019, and it has been modified four times since. The Apollo Place development next door is part of the same approval, as SYD2's fifth phase.

On its SYD2 page, the company says it has "no plans for any additional data centre developments in Lane Cove" beyond SYD2 and the approved Apollo Place building next door. Once Apollo Place is complete, the two will form one integrated data centre campus.

The company has been part of the Lane Cove West business precinct since it announced SYD2 in 2019. It helped fund new STEM classrooms at Lane Cove West Public School. Its team has also planted tree seedlings in Lane Cove National Park with the Foundation for National Parks and Wildlife.

Two other data centre proposals in the same business park were withdrawn this year. Goodman withdrew Project Mars at 12 Mars Road in September. A proposal by two landholders at 16-20 Mars Road left the NSW fast-track list in October.

The Hunter campus is planned at 550.5MW

Kurri Kurri is planned at almost four times the power of the Mars Road proposal. The campus on the former Hydro Aluminium smelter site, in the NSW Hunter, has a total power consumption of 550.5MW in its planning application. The NSW planning portal shows it on public exhibition from 14 October to 11 November, and the Australian Financial Review reported in September that Anthropic was in talks to anchor it.

In Victoria, AirTrunk plans a seven-building campus at Mickleham, in Melbourne's north, valued at A$4.3 billion in its federal environmental documents. In October it raised A$4.25 billion to keep building SYD3 in Western Sydney, and put its further investment in Australia at A$75 billion over the next decade.

What to watch

The Mars Road file. The project still shows at the Prepare EIS stage on the NSW planning portal, until the application is withdrawn or its study requirements expire on 31 August 2028.

Apollo Place. Construction of SYD2's fifth phase completes the Lane Cove West campus.

Kurri Kurri's exhibition. Public submissions close on 11 November, and AirTrunk then responds to them before the department assesses the project.