Thailand sets data centre rules with 20 MW industrial-zone line

Thailand sets data centre rules with 20 MW industrial-zone line

10 November 2026: Thailand's Cabinet has approved rules that sort data centres into seven classes by power draw and confine every site of 20 MW or more to industrial zones. Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Ekniti Nitithanprapas announced the decision on Tuesday, after a rush of applications that the government says far exceeded genuine demand.

Not yet independently verified. This rests on reports by the Bangkok Post and AFP; the government's own site did not answer our requests. The noise and temperature figures are described as proposed, and no effective date has been published yet. We will update this when it can be confirmed, and remove this note.

Seven classes and one dividing line

The classes run from below 0.5 MW, through bands of 0.5 to 5, 5 to 10, 10 to 20, 20 to 50 and 50 to 200 MW, to sites of 200 MW and above. The line that matters is at 20 MW. Below it a data centre may be built in a commercial zone and follows environmental codes of practice, whose details will be set after a public consultation. At 20 MW and above, stricter rules apply and the site must be in an industrial zone.

According to AFP, the proposed standards cap noise at the site boundary at 70 dBA, limit the rise in nearby temperatures to between 1 and 2 degrees Celsius, and require cooling water to be recirculated and tested before it is discharged. Projects approved before 14 August get a year to meet the environmental guidelines.

One door for approvals

Until now approvals were split across several agencies, which the Bangkok Post says encouraged developers to reserve electricity capacity on speculation. The Ministry of Digital Economy and Society will run a one-stop service centre with a screening committee, and plans a dashboard, the TH-DC Dashboard, to track projects in real time.

Investment applications will be scored on jobs, skills, local supply chains and clean energy, not only on the money committed. Danucha Pichayanan of the national economic planning council said data centres are generally not required to carry out a full environmental impact assessment.

Thirty gigawatts of requests

The figures behind the decision explain its timing. More than 110 applicants have asked for over 30,000 MW of power, and Ekniti said a quarter or fewer of them are genuine. The Board of Investment has approved 57 projects, of which 17 are operating, 20 hold construction permits and 20 are preparing to invest. In September the government asked the developers of nearly 50 projects under construction to pause.

"The use of national resources must not adversely affect the public," Ekniti said, as quoted by AFP.

What it changes for capacity in Thailand

For a company planning to host workloads in Thailand, the rules mostly affect where and how fast new large sites can be built rather than existing contracts. A provider with a project above 20 MW on commercial land will need to move or redesign it, and screening at a single committee may slow approvals while the backlog of speculative requests is cleared. Our data centre management software category lists nine products.

The detailed codes of practice for sites under 20 MW, and the date the rules take effect, are still to be published.

Sources

• Bangkok Post: Cabinet approves new data centre rules, 10 November 2026, 10 November 2026
• AFP via The Korea Herald: Thailand approves data centre rules, 10 November 2026, 10 November 2026