Satellites Should Vet AI Data Center and Energy Projects, Scientists Say

A quiet revolution is unfolding above our heads, and a team of researchers at the University of Surrey believes governments are failing to exploit it. Writing in the journal Nature Reviews Clean Technology, the group argues that Earth observation data, the vast streams of information collected by satellites orbiting the planet, should become a formal, legally embedded requirement in how governments, regulators and investors approve and monitor the infrastructure of the clean energy transition. At the heart of their argument is a pressing modern dilemma: the explosive growth of artificial intelligence has triggered a global race to build data centers, and those facilities consume enormous quantities of electricity and water. The researchers contend that decisions about where to place them are being made with dangerously incomplete information, when satellites already provide detailed, regularly updated evidence about power, water and land that is too often ignored.

The scale of the challenge is staggering. According to the International Energy Agency, electricity consumption by data centers is expected to double from 485 terawatt-hours in 2025 to 950 terawatt-hours by 2030, a figure roughly equivalent to the total annual electricity use of Japan. In Britain, the pressure is already visible in the queue to connect to the national grid. Figures from Ofgem, the energy regulator, show that contracted demand in that queue surged from 41 gigawatts in November 2024 to 125 gigawatts by June 2025, with data center projects driving much of the increase. Every one of those connections represents a long-term commitment to a specific location, with consequences for grid capacity, renewable energy availability, water resources and the surrounding landscape. Dr Ana Andries, Senior Lecturer in GIS, Remote Sensing and Environmental Assessment at the University of Surrey and lead author of the Comment, argues that this evidence should be written directly into the rules that govern approvals.

“Every new data center is a long-term decision about power, water and land, while also an increasing source of global carbon emissions,” Andries said. “Satellites already give us detailed and regularly updated information on all three, yet that evidence is too often left out of the decisions that matter. We’re asking governments to write it into the rules, so the infrastructure behind the AI boom goes where the grid, renewable energy potential and the landscape can support it.” Her point is not that satellites are unknown to planners, but that their use remains ad hoc and discretionary. The researchers want Earth observation elevated from an optional analytical curiosity to a mandatory component of renewable energy zoning, infrastructure permitting, climate-risk screening and environmental impact assessment, particularly where projects touch land, water, biodiversity or grid access.

The technical case rests on the remarkable breadth of what modern satellites can measure. For planning purposes, the team points to the Global Solar Atlas, which uses satellite data to map solar power potential across the entire planet, allowing developers and regulators to identify locations with strong and reliable sunlight before a single panel is installed. Alongside it, MapYourGrid, an open-source community project, is mapping power lines, substations and power plants so that planners can see precisely where new generation could connect to existing networks. Combining these layers with information on land-surface temperature, open water and groundwater availability, drought exposure, biodiversity, land-use constraints and climate-risk projections produces a strategic picture that no single ground survey could match. In effect, the researchers describe a decision-support system in which the siting of energy-hungry facilities becomes a data-driven exercise rather than a race driven by land prices and political expediency.

Once infrastructure is built, satellites can continue to earn their keep. Thermal imaging from space can reveal operational faults such as hot spots on solar panels, enabling operators to detect underperforming equipment across vast installations without sending technicians to inspect every row. Radar instruments aboard the Sentinel-1 satellites can map wind conditions at the sea surface around offshore wind farms, including the slower air in the wakes that turbines leave behind them, information that matters both for the efficiency of downstream turbines and for understanding how large wind arrays alter local atmospheric flow. These monitoring capabilities transform satellites from a planning tool into a continuous oversight mechanism, one that operates independently of the companies being watched and covers territory that would be expensive or impossible to survey from the ground.

Water is where the vulnerability of energy systems becomes most vivid. The researchers highlight this summer’s drought in Europe, which pushed the Danube to record lows and forced Romania to shut down both reactors at the Cernavodă nuclear plant, a facility that normally supplies about a fifth of the country’s electricity. The episode illustrates a systemic risk: power stations that rely on rivers for cooling, and hydropower dams that depend on reservoir levels, are exposed to climate extremes that are shifting faster than many planning assumptions. Satellite monitoring of river levels, reservoirs and drought conditions can help estimate these risks in advance, supporting the protection of a dispatchable electricity supply, the dependable generation that grids need when the wind does not blow and the sun does not shine. In a warming world, the researchers suggest, no serious energy plan should be written without this kind of continuous environmental intelligence.

Accountability is another frontier. Methane-sensing satellites have demonstrated the ability to detect releases as small as 0.03 tonnes per hour in single-blind controlled tests, although performance varied between systems. That sensitivity gives regulators a practical way to verify emissions from oil and gas infrastructure rather than relying solely on self-reported figures, a shift with profound implications for how environmental compliance is enforced. Satellite imagery has also been used to map mining expansion linked to clean-energy supply chains in the Democratic Republic of Congo, offering transparency about the environmental footprint of the minerals that wind turbines, solar panels and batteries depend on. Together, these examples sketch a picture of Earth observation as an independent audit layer for the entire energy economy, from extraction to generation to transmission.

The researchers are careful to draw boundaries around their proposal. Satellite data, they argue, should support decisions, not replace ground data, local knowledge or official reporting. Space-based measurements have their own uncertainties, and the authors call for clear data standards, validation requirements and transparent reporting of uncertainty in energy plans and regulatory documents. For investors and utilities, they recommend incorporating satellite evidence into due diligence and asset-risk assessment, so that capital flows toward projects whose environmental foundations have been independently verified. Delivering this vision, they acknowledge, will require substantial capacity building: energy ministries, regulators, utilities, local authorities and investors all need trusted satellite products, practical guidance, standards, training and evidence that the approach is genuinely cost-effective before it can become routine practice.

Professor Ravi Silva, Distinguished Professor and Director of the Advanced Technology Institute at the University of Surrey and co-author of the Comment, framed the proposal as a matter of decision quality across thousands of individual choices. “Building a clean energy future requires thousands of decisions, from choosing locations for solar farms, wind turbines, transmission infrastructure and energy storage to ensuring these assets operate effectively over their lifetime,” Silva said. “Better evidence helps make these decisions more efficient, cost-effective and reliable. Satellite data can help identify areas with strong solar and wind resources, map existing infrastructure, detect operational issues, and provide independent information to support monitoring and oversight.” As the AI boom collides with the realities of grids, droughts and finite landscapes, the Surrey team’s message to governments is blunt: the evidence needed to build the digital age sustainably is already streaming down from orbit, and the only missing ingredient is the political will to require that someone actually looks at it.

Subject of Research: Using satellite Earth observation data to guide clean energy transition and data center planning

Article Title: Require satellite evidence for energy and AI data center approvals, researchers urge governments

Article References: Require satellite evidence for energy and AI data center approvals, researchers urge governments. (n.d.). Original publication

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: Not provided

Keywords: Earth observation, satellites, data centers, artificial intelligence, clean energy, grid capacity, water resources, drought, methane monitoring, renewable energy, energy policy, remote sensing