Few issues have so starkly revealed the shifting sands of Britain’s post-Brexit landscape as the country’s approach to environmental protection and digital infrastructure. On August 22, 2025, two significant reports—one tracking the UK’s environmental divergence from the European Union, and another providing new insight into the water consumption of commercial data centres—painted a complex, sometimes contradictory picture of where the nation stands on sustainability and digital growth.
Since the UK’s formal exit from the EU in 2021, the country’s environmental legislation has steadily diverged from its European neighbors. According to reporting by The Guardian, the EU has not only maintained but strengthened its environmental protections, while the UK has, in many cases, moved in the opposite direction. Laws governing everything from air pollution to water quality have been weakened, with some EU regulations removed from the UK’s statute books entirely.
Environmental analysts from the Institute for European Environmental Policy, cited in The Guardian, have tracked this divergence closely. Their findings are sobering: the UK is now lagging behind the EU in protecting rare species such as red squirrels, in cleaning up polluted air and water, in banning hazardous chemicals, and in making consumer goods more recyclable and energy efficient. The contrast is especially stark in areas like water treatment, where the EU is introducing a new, advanced level known as quaternary treatment to remove microplastics and persistent “forever chemicals” from waterways. The UK, meanwhile, has no current plans to match this upgrade, sticking with its existing three-tier system—primary, secondary, and tertiary treatment.
“We are falling behind, and simply not developing at the pace of other countries when it comes to removing harmful waste from the environment,” the Guardian analysis concluded. Even Singapore, often lauded for its deregulation, has already adopted quaternary treatment. The EU’s approach goes further by making polluting companies foot the bill for these high-tech upgrades, a policy not mirrored in the UK.
One of the most significant divergences has occurred in the protection of habitats for rare wildlife. The UK government, first under the Conservatives and now under Labour, has loosened or removed key EU directives, including the Habitats Directive, which once provided vital protections for species like nightingales, red squirrels, and dormice. The loosening of air pollution rules and the removal of legal duties under the Water Framework Directive to monitor and clean rivers have compounded concerns among environmentalists.
For many, the 2024 general election brought hope. Labour, led by Keir Starmer, campaigned on promises of strengthened environmental protections and a reset in relations with the EU. Yet, as The Guardian reports, the new government has instead accelerated the rollback of environmental rules. “Keir Starmer’s government has instead cut environmental protections further and faster than the Tories ever did,” the report noted. The government’s focus on reviving the economy, with Chancellor Rachel Reeves unable to cut spending or raise taxes significantly, has led to a prioritization of economic growth over environmental safeguards. This has included removing regulations that previously limited development in sensitive habitats.
The divergence is not just a matter of policy, but of regulatory capacity. The EU’s environmental regulators are widely regarded as among the world’s best, with substantial funding and technical expertise. This enables them to identify dangerous chemicals and devise innovative pollution controls—capabilities that, post-Brexit, the UK struggles to match.
Promises of a “green Brexit” made by former environment secretary Michael Gove and ex-prime minister Boris Johnson have, so far, not materialized. The “world-beating” environmental protections once touted now appear to have been more rhetoric than reality. As the dust settles, the warnings of those who cautioned against Brexit’s environmental risks look increasingly prescient.
Yet, even as the UK retreats from some environmental standards, other sectors are showing signs of innovation and sustainability—albeit with their own challenges. On the same day as the Guardian’s sobering assessment, techUK published a landmark report, Understanding Data Centre Water Use in England, in collaboration with the Environment Agency. The survey, covering 73 commercial colocation data centre sites, offers a rare, data-driven look at how these critical facilities use water.
Contrary to some public perceptions, the report found that most commercial data centres are relatively low water users. More than half (51%) of surveyed sites use waterless cooling systems, and 64% consume less than 10,000 cubic meters of water per year—roughly equivalent to a typical leisure centre or a Premier League football club. Nearly nine in ten operators either measure their water use or do not need to, thanks to closed-loop cooling systems. Only 4% of sites reported water use above 100,000 cubic meters per year, a level comparable to industrial manufacturing.
As Matthew Evans, Director of Markets and COO at techUK, put it: “Data centres are the backbone of the UK’s digital economy and will be central to delivering our AI and innovation ambitions. This report shows that, contrary to some public perceptions, most commercial data centres are actively innovating to use minimal water.”
However, the techUK report also highlighted significant gaps in data and planning. With the UK government aiming to expand sovereign compute capacity twentyfold by 2030, the need for sustainable growth is urgent. The report calls for a range of actions, including building new reservoirs, developing a UK-wide Water Exploitation Index to map local water stress, and creating a digital-first water strategy that leverages smart monitoring and leak prevention.
Industry recommendations include adopting advanced cooling technologies, measuring and reporting water usage and Water Usage Effectiveness (WUE), and joining the Climate Neutral Data Centre Pact to commit to water efficiency targets. Both government and industry are urged to develop standardised AI chip cooling requirements, establish public-private partnerships for infrastructure upgrades, and ensure early coordination between developers, water companies, and local authorities.
Richard Thompson, the Environment Agency’s Deputy Director for Water Resources, welcomed the findings: “Advancements in technology must go hand-in-hand with protecting public water supplies, food security and the environment. It is vital the sector puts sustainability at its heart, and minimises water use in line with evolving standards.”
Stephen Meleady of Stantec echoed the importance of collaboration and innovation: “Only through the development of innovative technology and circular, sustainable thinking have operators been able to make such significant improvements in efficiency. The momentum around innovation needs to continue as the industry rapidly expands across the UK.”
The techUK survey is not without its limitations—it focused on a subset of the sector, excluding on-premise and enterprise data centres, and was based on voluntary, anonymous submissions. Still, it represents one of the first systematic attempts to quantify data centre water usage in England and provides a valuable starting point for dialogue and regulation.
As pressure mounts from both climate change and the UK’s AI ambitions, the reports make one thing clear: the path to a sustainable, digitally enabled future will require not just innovation, but a willingness to learn from global best practices and to put environmental protection at the heart of policy and industry decisions.
