The building is going up, the customer has signed, and the power is not coming. That is where NextDC finds itself at M3, its 225 MW campus in West Footscray, Melbourne. The Australian operator asked for a trading halt on 19 October and then told the market that Jemena, the local electricity distributor, has suspended part of the 66 kV line works needed for the next increase in grid supply to the site.
A Council Consent, Not A Transformer
The hold-up is not technical. According to NextDC's filing as reported by Cyber Daily and Bush Letter, Jemena stopped the works in September, citing community and stakeholder opposition and the absence of local council consent while further consultation takes place. Jemena does not expect to restart before February 2027, so NextDC now expects the next supply step for M3 in its 2028 financial year.
The money followed quickly. NextDC cut its FY27 net revenue guidance to A$475-500 million from A$615-640 million and underlying EBITDA to A$245-265 million from A$385-410 million. About A$140 million of each came from the affected M3 contracts, which are out of the guidance until the company can estimate when they will contribute. Capital expenditure for the year was lowered to A$4.5-5.0 billion, new development projects and land purchases are paused, and the board will look at selling selected development sites.
The capacity at M3 stays under contract and data hall construction continues; NextDC says it is working with its customer and Jemena on a revised power ramp. The company reported about A$8.7 billion of liquidity at the end of September. The shares, which closed at A$9.16 on 16 October, lost 41.7 percent on 21 October, according to Fortune.
The Last Kilometres Of Cable
Most discussion of data center power is about generation and transmission capacity. Here the weak link was a distribution line upgrade and a road authority's signature. Fortune notes that Australian residents raise the same concerns heard in the United States: power, water and noise. A separate planning application for further stages at M3, lodged in February, is expected to be decided only after the Victorian state election on 28 November.
For anyone planning a campus, the practical lesson is about the schedule rather than the engineering. Halls can be finished and fitted out long before the supply they were designed for arrives, and every month in between is paid for. Some developers bridge such gaps with temporary or permanent on-site generation, which brings its own permits, fuel logistics and neighbours, and is not a quick fix on a residential edge either. The same kind of grid delay recently cost a UK project its tenant, as we reported on Microsoft and Nscale in Loughton. More on power for data centers.
Sources: Cyber Daily, Bush Letter, Fortune
