Our work
Harnessing Data Centre Heat
The UK is in the middle of a data centre boom, driven by surging demand for AI infrastructure. But while policymakers and investors focus on the electricity these facilities consume, almost no attention has been paid to what they produce: vast quantities of waste heat, currently going to waste. EnergiRaven, an organisation mapping the future of heat in the UK, was founded on the conviction that this represents one of the country’s most significant untapped energy opportunities. In 2025, it appointed Diffusion to put that argument on the national agenda.
With waste heat recovery already standard practice across much of northern Europe, where data centres and industrial sources are routinely connected to district heating networks, the UK’s failure to follow suit represents both a policy gap and a missed opportunity EnergiRaven was determined to close. The brief was clear: establish EnergiRaven as the authoritative voice on waste heat and heat networks in the UK, and demonstrate through original research the scale of the opportunity the country risks missing.
Insight & Idea
Heat is the largest share of the UK’s energy demand, yet it consistently receives less policy attention than electricity. EnergiRaven’s core insight was that the coming wave of data centre construction creates a time-limited opportunity to change that, connecting a high-profile national conversation about AI infrastructure to an underdeveloped one about affordable, low-carbon heat.
Diffusion’s strategy was to give that argument an undeniable evidential foundation. Working with EnergiRaven and leading Danish energy consultancy Viegand Maagøe, Diffusion developed original analysis modelling the waste heat output of projected UK data centre growth out to 2035, calculating how many homes it could supply under both lower and upper bound scenarios. The research was given further narrative force by mapping where data centres are clustered against planned new towns and existing fuel poverty hotspots, revealing that in many cases the infrastructure needed to connect the two is the only thing standing in the way.
Diffusion packaged the findings to land across both national and trade media, with strong data visualisations and a clear policy ask for investment in Heat Highways to capture and distribute waste heat at scale, giving journalists and commentators a concrete hook for the story.
Impact & Action
The research generated over 30 pieces of coverage across UK utilities, sustainability and energy trade media, with hero placements chosen to reach both the policy and business audiences most able to act on the findings.
CNBC covered the story as part of its broader reporting on the future of AI infrastructure and energy, connecting the waste heat opportunity to the global data centre expansion debate. BusinessGreen led with the upper bound figure, framing the story as a national opportunity the UK risks squandering without urgent investment in heat network infrastructure. Data Centre Review brought the findings directly to the data centre industry’s own audience, while Edie and Transport & Energy extended reach further into the sustainability and energy policy communities most engaged with heat network deployment.
The campaign established EnergiRaven as the leading advocate for waste heat recovery and Heat Highways in the UK policy debate, connecting the data centre boom directly to the challenge of affordable home heating for the first time. Incoming media requests for commentary on heat network policy have followed, positioning EnergiRaven as a credible and distinctive voice in the UK’s energy transition conversation.
The Metrics
