According to a Moody's analysis, datacenters in Europe are set to become major electricity consumers by 2035, potentially pushing up energy bills for households and businesses. The facilities accounted for a low single-digit share of power demand in most large European markets in 2025—typically around 2.5%—but that is expected to change as capacity expands.
Growth will be uneven. Moody's projects datacenters will account for at least 5.7% of electricity demand in the UK and France by 2035, while the Netherlands could reach 17% and Ireland 30%. Ireland is already an outlier: datacenters consumed 23% of its electricity in 2025, up from 5% a decade earlier. The EU's goal of more than tripling datacenter capacity within five to seven years, and spreading projects to the Nordics and southern Europe, will require substantial investment in generation and grid infrastructure.
Those investments, combined with supply-demand imbalances, are likely to push prices higher, Moody's says. Governments may respond with measures such as price caps, taxes, or levies. Ireland has already replaced a moratorium with a rule requiring large connections to provide matching generation or storage and meet 80% of annual demand through additional renewables. The US has adopted a Ratepayer Protection Pledge, and Moody's expects more European governments to follow suit if growth continues.