Amazon boosts Australian data centre investment to $20bn as Albanese visits Seattle

During Anthony Albanese’s visit to its Seattle headquarters, Amazon announced a $20 billion investment in Australian data centres and renewables, expanding its local footprint to support the AI boom.

Anthony Albanese joined by Australian ambassador to the United States Kevin Rudd and Amazon Web Services chief Matt Garman in Seattle.

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US global tech giant Amazon will pump $20bn into Australia over five years to expand its data centre network, cloud infrastructure and energy generation, including new investment in three solar farms across Victoria and Queensland.

Amazon Web Services chief executive Matt Garman – who leads the company’s cloud, data centre and artificial intelligence business – said the funding pledge out to 2029 was the “largest investment ever announced by a global technology provider in Australia”.

Standing alongside Anthony Albanese at Amazon’s Seattle headquarters on Sunday (AEST), Mr Garman was asked whether nuclear power would be required over the long-term to ensure energy-intensive data centres can sustainably harness the full power of AI.

Mr Albanese alongside Amazon Web Services chief Matt Garman. Picture: Supplied

With competitors including Microsoft and Google directing major funding and resources into nuclear Small Modular Reactors, Mr Garman has repeatedly outlined the importance of nuclear energy in supporting AI development since becoming AWS chief executive in June last year.

After signing agreements last year to support the development of SMRs, Mr Garman declared that nuclear is a “safe source of carbon-free energy that can help power our operations and meet the growing demands of our customers”.

Mr Garman, who recently urged British authorities to ramp up nuclear generation alongside renewables to help power the data centres needed for developing artificial intelligence, on Sunday said it was definitely the case that “the explosion of AI requires a lot of power”.

“That’s one of the things we’re thinking about. Here in the United States, we see nuclear as part of that portfolio. I think depending on the local set-up and economies and other things, it’s a global question, but there’s no question that we will continue to need more and more power going forward,” Mr Garman said.

“It’s an important thing that we spend a lot of time on. But it depends on which source of power we choose. Sometimes it’s renewables sources, sometimes it’s hydro.

“From a technology perspective, Australia is incredibly important and a great market for us. From an energy perspective, it’s a portfolio approach for us and I don’t think any one technology is right for every situation.”

The $20bn AWS commitment, which incorporates prior funding pledges made by the company, includes expansions of Amazon’s data centres in Sydney and Melbourne, and investment in three new solar projects. The solar farms will be delivered by European Energy, with Amazon committing to purchase a combined capacity of more than 170MW.

Amazon already has investments in eight solar and wind projects in Victoria, Queensland and NSW, which help power AWS operations including data and fulfilment centres. Mr Garman said once all 11 renewable energy projects are up-and-running, they will generate more than 1.4 million megawatt hours of emissions-friendly power annually.

Mr Albanese said the Amazon investment represents “an exciting opportunity for Australia to build AI capability using secure, resilient infrastructure”.

With the Albanese government positioning productivity as a top economic priority during its second term, the Prime Minister said the AWS expansion plans were “exactly the kind of economic investment in our nation that we want to see, and creates opportunities for continued innovation and growth”.

“The investment will generate economic opportunity for Australians, including skilled jobs and infrastructure that can support complex AI and supercomputing applications,” Mr Albanese said.

Amazon’s investment builds on the $13.2bn commitment it made in 2023 to expand cloud operations in Sydney and Melbourne by 2027. AWS has also been engaged by the government on a $2bn deal to establish a “top secret” data cloud that will store classified military and intelligence information.

After AWS helped support the rise of Australia’s biggest tech success stories including Canva and Atlassian, Mr Garman said he was excited about collaborating with CBA and helping the bank harness the power of AI to support a range of services including fraud detection and automated credit scoring, which would assist in matching loans for customers.

Asked about warnings issued last week by top energy regulators and executives about spiralling clean energy build-out costs threatening Australia’s ambition to claim a share of the global data centre market, Mr Garman said Amazon’s investment includes renewable projects.

“We bring co-ordination. We make sure that we can build those in a sustainable way. We feel confident that with these new wind and solar projects that we’re adding, that brings net new energy to the country and we feel good about those.”

Mr Albanese will attend a technology and innovation business reception hosted by Australia’s Ambassador to the US, Kevin Rudd, in Seattle later on Sunday. The Labor leader will talk-up the strength of the Australia-US trade relationship in front of US-based tech executives from companies including Diraq, Trellis Health, BHP Ventures, Airwallex and Anthropic.