Quick facts
- The government has set a rule that data centres in Malaysia meet at least a 30% renewable-energy requirement.
- Stated in Parliament by Deputy Prime Minister Fadillah Yusof, who also holds the energy transition portfolio, in late October 2026.
- The government is pointing operators to the Corporate Renewable Energy Supply Scheme for green power, and encouraging them to build their own solar on site.
- As of August, data centres were drawing 58.5% of their contracted demand, 1,374 MW against 2,346 MW.
- The Energy Commission is still writing the framework, and no start date was stated.
Malaysia is tying its fast-growing data-centre industry to green power. Deputy Prime Minister Fadillah Yusof, who is also the Energy Transition and Water Transformation Minister, told Parliament that data centres will have to meet a renewable-energy requirement of at least 30 per cent. The requirement has been decided, though the detail is still being worked out.
The Energy Commission is writing a full framework and set of guidelines for how data centres generate their own power and buy renewable energy. The government is pointing operators to the Corporate Renewable Energy Supply Scheme for green electricity bought directly, and encouraging them to put solar generation on their own sites.
Fadillah said steering data centres toward their own solar is intended to prevent an increase in electricity supply costs for other consumers. That is a live concern because data centres have contracted far more grid power than they draw, a tension we looked at when data centres came to dominate Malaysia's grid talk even as homes grew their power use twice as fast.
Contracted demand runs well ahead of the actual draw. As of August, data centres were drawing 58.5 per cent of their contracted electricity demand, 1,374 MW against 2,346 MW. Fadillah said operators tend to over-estimate when they apply: "Sometimes, at the initial stage, when they apply for an electricity supply contract, they estimate how much power they will need, but their actual consumption turns out to be lower than the amount requested." A Data Centre Task Force has been set up to assess the industry's actual electricity demand and consumption patterns.
The green rule lands amid Malaysia's broader AI and data-centre build-out, the growth that has put the sector's power use into public debate.
What is still open is the detail. The Energy Commission has not published its guidelines. The exact measurement basis and timing are still being finalised, and it is not yet clear whether the floor covers existing centres or only new projects. No start date was stated. Those guidelines are the thing to watch.
