Norsk kraft subsidierer irsk fortjeneste

Norsk kraft subsidies Irish revenue, with Norwegian data centers consuming 3.2 terawatt-hours (TWh) in 2025 - roughly 2% of the country's total consumption. Operators seeking 26 TWh have received binding agreements for connectivity, with over 70% planning start-ups before 2031. Further 54 TWh is in the pipeline based on 70% utilization of approved capacity.

Traditional power has historically attracted foreign investment, jobs, and tax revenue. The question is how data centers supply this. Power is already becoming a scarce resource. Therefore, it is natural to question how many jobs a data center creates per kilowatt-hour. Circumstantial analyses highlight high employment during the setup phase, but this is a temporary build-up effect.

Once the data center is operational, employment dramatically drops. Figures from Menon Economics, commissioned by the industry itself, show that large-scale data centers generate 0.2 years of work per gigawatt-hour (GWh), compared to 0.9 for traditionally power-intensive industries. The difference is four and a half times. A 100 MW data center uses roughly 0.6 TWh annually and generates, based on Menon's figures, 140 years of work.

This is significant for a facility that consumes half a percent of Norway's electricity. The thought experiment is illustrative: if all of Norway's electricity went to data centers, it would create roughly 35,000 jobs. That number tells the most about the employment effect. Google is now connected to 240 megawatts (MW) at its KI data center in Skien and is waiting for an additional 960 MW.

This results in an annual consumption of over 7 TWh. Microsoft plans to invest 66 billion kroner in a new AI data center in Narvik. The investment is substantial. The tax revenue is not. Microsoft Datacenter Norway AS has operated data centers in Norway since 2019. Until June 30, 2025, the company had generated a total revenue of 8.8 billion kroner.

Cumulative operating profit (EBIT) amounted to 761 million kroner - a margin of 8.6%. This is in stark contrast to Microsoft's global operating margin of 45%. The explanation is simple: revenue is calculated as a draw on operating costs, starting from internal agreements with sister companies in Ireland. Norwegian margins end up being just a fraction of a percent of the corporation's.

The creation happens in Norway; profits are booked elsewhere. The picture is the same for Google. The company sells billions of kroner's worth of advertising in the Norwegian market every year, but the revenues are booked outside Norway. Google Norway AS, which provides sales support to Google's Irish subsidiary, had a total revenue of 357 million kroner in 2025 and paid 8 million in taxes.

When Google's Skien data center opens, tax payments will increase somewhat. There is still reason to be frugal with Norwegian eyes. Intern pricing models systematically ensure that a minimal share of value creation is taxed where the power is actually consumed. The image is clear: data centers create few jobs per kilowatt-hour, and internal pricing models mean little of the value creation is taxed in Norway.

Every kilowatt-hour we allocate to a data center is a kilowatt-hour taken away from something else - from an industry that creates four and a half times as many jobs, or from other industries that are already noting power becoming more expensive. IEA's baseline scenario for 2030 projects global data centers to use 1,000 TWh. Norway's share of global GDP is expected to be three percent in 2030.

As of 2025, Norwegian data center activity is on the level of three years' worth of GDP. The projects with reservations in the queue could triple consumption within a few years. What we are facilitating is not a digital infrastructure for Norway. It is power supplies for global tech giants that create minimal jobs and pay minimal tax here.

The question is not whether Norway needs data centers. We do - to some extent. The question is whether it is wise that such a large share of the country's power production is bound by actors who neither create employment nor generate tax revenue commensurate with the resource use they incur.