Electricity demand from data centres to reach 13.56 GW by 2031-32: MeitY's Jitin Prasada

Electricity demand from data centres in the country is expected to reach 13.56 gigawatt by 2031-32, Parliament was informed on Friday.

In a written reply to the Rajya Sabha, Minister of State for Electronics and IT, Jitin Prasada said the total data centre capacity in the country increased from 375 megawatt (MW) in 2020 to around 1,500 MW by 2025.

"The expected electricity demand from the growth of AI and other large-scale data centres is factored into the planning process of the government. As per information available with Ministry of Power, electricity demand from data centres is estimated to reach 13.56 GW by 2031-32," Prasada said.


The minister said about 38,231 Graphics Processing Units (GPUs) have been onboarded through 14 empanelled service providers and data centres under the AI compute capacity framework to support AI development.

"These are being provided to startups, researchers, academia and other eligible users at a subsidised average rate of Rs 65 per hour. This is about one-third of the global average cost. These data centres are located across the country such as Mumbai, Navi Mumbai, Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Noida and Jamnagar," Prasada said.