At a glance
Whanganui & Partners, Whanganui District Council's economic development department, markets the Whanganui District as a data centre hub that could grow towards about 50MW of computing load.
Transpower's 2026 planning report includes no large data centre in its load forecasts.
Whanganui District Council says it has not decided to develop or fund a data centre, and no data centre proposal has been put to it.
Powerco and Transpower plan to shift Whanganui's load to the Brunswick substation, where Powerco has committed to a second transformer with a 2027 need date.
Energy Estate, an Australian developer, named Te Utanganui near Palmerston North as a green data centre location in November 2024.
Whanganui District Council's economic development department is marketing the Whanganui District to data centre investors. Whanganui & Partners describes a staged "energy-anchored data centre precinct that could grow towards approximately 50MW of compute load over time", on its Future Energy page. The page says the material "is intended to support further engagement with potential investors and infrastructure partners".
A 50MW precinct would be about a quarter of the roughly 208MW of colocation capacity New Zealand had in June 2026, on market researcher Arizton's count. That count leaves out the AWS and Microsoft cloud regions, and the 50MW is a long-run target, not a commitment. The pitch rests on two nearby grid connection points, industrial land and planned wind and solar projects.
Whanganui & Partners pitches enterprise and sovereign workloads
The council announced in March 2024 that Whanganui & Partners would become one of its departments. Its Future Energy page lists three investment opportunities: wind and solar generation, synthetic fuels and the data centre hub. Whanganui & Partners commissioned a regional wind assessment from Elemental Group, finalised in June 2025.
The hub targets "enterprise, sovereign, cloud, disaster recovery, secure storage and other non-latency-critical workloads". Non-latency-critical work is computing that does not need a split-second response, so it can run far from its users. The page cites "proximity to the Brunswick 220kV GXP and Whanganui 110kV GXP, development-ready industrial land, and potential future renewable generation from projects such as Waiinu and Harakeke".
A grid exit point, or GXP, is where Transpower's national grid hands power to the local lines company. Whanganui & Partners published a page on 1 March 2026 describing a "Whanganui-led regional data centre hub" for export-focused AI and cloud computing.
The council says no data centre proposal has reached it
"The council has not made a decision to develop or fund a data centre," Whanganui District Council states on its Future Energy and data centres page. The page adds that "No data centre proposal has been put to the council".
Elected members have been briefed on the Future Energy opportunities, according to the page. Neither the programme nor the opportunities identified through it have been "formally considered or endorsed by elected members". The council adopted terms of reference for a review of its economic development work on 6 August 2026.
According to the council page, the data centre material was temporarily removed from the Whanganui & Partners website because it "could be taken to imply a confirmed council position". The Future Energy page carried the hub text, with a line on the district's role, when read on 2 November.
Powerco and Transpower plan to shift Whanganui's load to Brunswick
The two grid connection points in the pitch are changing. Peak load at Whanganui substation "already exceeds the n-1 capacity of the supply transformers", Transpower says in its 2026 Transmission Planning Report. N-1 capacity is the load a substation can carry with one transformer out of service.
"The preferred option is currently for Powerco to shift its remaining load to Brunswick and for the supply at Whanganui to be decommissioned," the report states, adding that this "will be reassessed closer to the time". Brunswick, north of the city, runs on a single 220/33kV, 50MVA transformer. Powerco has committed to a second transformer there, with a grid need date of 2027 and an indicative cost of NZ$14.4 million.
Transpower's load forecasts include no large data centre. The report notes that large data centres are being proposed in New Zealand, but "none currently meet the threshold of firm commitment". Transpower is already assessing about a gigawatt of data centre connection enquiries nationally.
Energy Estate named Te Utanganui for green data centres in 2024
Kākāriki describes itself as an independent renewable energy platform formed by Energy Estate, Elemental Group, Regener8 Power and Tāmata Hauhā. Elemental Group also wrote the regional wind assessment for Whanganui & Partners.
Te Utanganui is the Central New Zealand Distribution Hub in Manawatū, around Palmerston North. Transpower's Bunnythorpe substation is about 8km north of the city. Energy Estate launched a data centre business, Digital Estate, on 28 November 2024, and named "Ohinewai and Te Utanganui (Palmerston North)" among its proposed green data centre locations.
Transpower's report puts Whanganui in its Taranaki planning region, where it leaves Contact Energy's possible 250MW Stratford data centre out of its load forecasts. To the north-east, Data Igloo plans a campus at the closed Karioi pulp mill in Ruapehu District.
What to watch
The economic development review. The council's Future Energy work, which includes the data centre case study, will be considered in the review, according to its page.
Brunswick's second transformer. Powerco's committed upgrade has a grid need date of 2027.
The 7 November election. The Greens would pause big data centre consents until rules exist, and Labour would require data centres to secure their own renewable power.