Google drives Finland’s data center boom with largest European investment

TECHNOLOGY

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Google drives Finland’s data center boom with largest European investment

A pledge of at least €13 billion for AI infrastructure is pulling new data center projects into Finland, though regulators have already halted work at two sites

by
Diego Almada Lopez

Oct. 8, 2026

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Google has picked Finland for the biggest single bet it has ever made in Europe. The company announced on September 9, 2026, that it will invest at least €13 billion ($15.1 billion) in AI infrastructure and data centers across the country.

There is one complication. A month after the announcement, Finnish regulators told Google to stop work at two of its new sites.

Where the €13 billion is going

The spending is scheduled to land over roughly two years, covering 2027 to 2028. It will fund three entirely new data centers in Kajaani, Muhos, and Vaala.

Google will also expand its existing campus in Hamina, which has been running since 2009. For scale, Google had already put €4.5 billion into Hamina before this announcement. The new pledge is nearly three times that figure, and it is described as a floor rather than a ceiling.

The jobs projections are hefty. The investment is expected to support more than 37,000 jobs during the construction phase, with approximately 16,000 of those directly in construction work.

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Once the facilities are operational, the project is expected to sustain around 7,000 ongoing jobs. Those positions are projected to pay wages approximately 24% above the Finnish median.

The investment is forecast to add an average of €3.6 billion a year to Finland’s GDP.

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Powering the machines

Google signed a 22-year power purchase agreement with utility Fortum that lets it buy up to 50% of the output from the Loviisa nuclear plant. The arrangement is also expected to support grid stability.

Google has also lined up contracts for wind energy and a 94 MW battery system, which can store power and release it when demand spikes or the wind drops off.

Why Finland keeps winning these deals

Finland’s pitch to data center operators comes down to two things: the cold and the grid. Low temperatures sharply cut the cost of keeping servers from overheating, which is one of the largest ongoing expenses in running a facility.

The country also offers access to cleaner energy, including nuclear and hydroelectric power.

The regulators hit pause

The rollout hit a snag on October 6, 2026. Finland’s Licensing and Supervisory Agency (LVV) ordered work to stop at the Muhos and Kajaani sites.

The issue was timing. Forest had been cleared at the sites before environmental impact assessments were finished.

Google acknowledged it had fallen short of compliance. The company pledged to follow the rules going forward and has outlined biodiversity measures, including planting 130 hectares of trees at the Muhos site where work was halted.

What this means

For Finland, the stakes are mostly economic, and they are large. A projected €3.6 billion annual GDP contribution and thousands of above-median-wage jobs would reshape regions like Kajaani, Muhos, and Vaala.

Energy is the other pressure point. Committing up to half of Loviisa’s output to one customer for 22 years is a major structural shift for Finland’s power market.

Disclosure: This article was edited by Diego Almada Lopez. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.