Data Centre Boom Sparks Fresh Water Scarcity Concerns in Pakistan

ISLAMABAD: As Pakistan accelerates plans to construct large-scale data centres to bolster its digital economy, environmental experts and policy analysts have raised urgent concerns regarding the mounting strain these facilities will place on the country’s dwindling freshwater resources. While official discourse has largely focused on economic investment, foreign exchange, and tech job creation, the massive cooling requirements of digital infrastructure present a severe ecological dilemma for a water-stressed nation.

Computing infrastructure generates tremendous heat, prompting facility operators to predominantly deploy open evaporative cooling systems because of their operational cost-effectiveness. However, these systems result in substantial volumes of water evaporating directly into the atmosphere rather than returning to local aquifers. International projections by the United Nations University estimate that by 2030, global data centres will consume an associated water footprint equivalent to the basic domestic needs of 1.3 billion people, compounding pressures on countries already facing acute hydrological stress.

For Pakistan, the broader implications are particularly precarious given the nation’s sharp transition into a water-scarce territory. Official metrics reveal that annual per capita water availability has plummeted from 5,600 cubic metres in 1947 to roughly 930 cubic metres in 2023. While economic planners advocate absorbing Pakistan’s surplus electricity capacity by establishing hyperscale server hubs, unchecked water consumption could pit digital modernization directly against agricultural food security and municipal drinking supplies.

Moving forward, technological experts and environmental regulators are urging federal ministries to mandate closed-loop cooling systems and integrate treated industrial wastewater standards before approving hyperscale computing licenses. Policy frameworks are expected to be tabled before the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecom to ensure that national digital expansion does not come at the cost of irreversible environmental degradation.