Bowen said the federal government would pass laws to prevent dissenting states and territories from allowing large data centres to be powered by fossil fuels. Australia is becoming one of the biggest markets for data centre development across the globe, with many facilities already operational. States and territories with the ambition to impose tighter requirements, including higher renewable energy thresholds or more stringent additionality rules, remained free to do so. Australia’s AU$150 billion (US$99 billion) data centre pipeline represents one of the largest inbound investment commitments in the country’s history. The AEMC has separately proposed new technical standards requiring large data centres to remain connected during grid faults rather than disconnecting, following international incidents where simultaneous disconnections caused cascading blackouts.