Sijbrandij launches data center power coalition for AI infrastructure in Europe.
The Sijbrandij Foundation has launched the Data Centre Power Coalition, a network of 12 founding energy partners focused on coordinating power supply for AI data centre projects. The coalition's members—Amperesand, DG Matrix, Emerald AI, florrent, GridCARE, Hammerhead AI, Hanwha Data Centres, Hitachi, NeuralWatt, Planted Solar, Skeleton Technologies and Voltus—span three areas of data centre energy development: on-site power generation, load flexibility, and faster grid interconnection.
The initiative responds to growing strain on electricity supplies as AI developers pursue massive computing clusters. Currently, most data centre operators assemble power solutions piecemeal from multiple specialist providers rather than using a coordinated framework. The coalition formalizes an approach the foundation developed in its Data Centre Power Playbook, published earlier this year.
The foundation's model treats power planning as integral to compute planning from the outset, rather than an afterthought. It combines on-site solar and storage, flexible demand management, and efforts to accelerate grid access. According to Aric Li, Director of Data Centre Energy at the Sijbrandij Foundation, execution complexity—not economics—has been the barrier: "The AI industry runs on procurement, but power is infrastructure. It has to be co-developed, planned alongside compute from the start, not bought piecemeal after the fact. That complexity, not the economics, is why the commercially superior path hasn't been adopted. We built the Data Centre Power Coalition to remove that complexity—streamlining both energy strategy through our living open-sourced Playbook and energy execution through our coalition of vetted partners."
The announcement reflects intensifying challenges in power availability. In several markets, developers have faced grid connection delays, limited transmission capacity, and concerns about local system reliability. These constraints are driving operators toward on-site generation, storage, and systems that make computing loads responsive to grid conditions.
Hitachi, among the initial participants, framed the coalition as a way to connect specialists across the sector. "No single company can solve data center power alone," said KJ Joshi, Chief Business Officer and Head of Data Centre Business at Hitachi. "Hitachi focuses on what we do best as an integrator and partners with best-in-class companies for the rest. That's what makes this coalition compelling—convening partners across the energy ecosystem to deliver reliable, clean power at the speed and scale AI demands."
By vetting members in advance, the coalition aims to reduce due diligence for data centre developers and streamline procurement. Several partners are expected to contribute across multiple areas of the framework rather than specializing in a single role. This structure may appeal particularly to infrastructure teams under pressure to bring capacity online quickly, where conventional utility timelines remain uncertain.
The Sijbrandij Foundation pursues sector-focused initiatives across cancer care, AI energy, education, philanthropy and art, often building projects internally before spinning them out as independent organizations. In the data centre market, electricity access has become central to expansion planning as demand for AI training and inference grows. The coalition's launch underscores how energy procurement, grid access, and site design are now treated as a single integrated challenge by companies seeking to add computing capacity.