The Andhra Pradesh government has given environmental clearances to the hyperscale AI data centres being built near Vizag by Google and the Adani Group, days before the foundation laying ceremony. Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu will lay the foundation for the project on April 28.
However, activists from the region have raised concerns over inadequate scrutiny of a project of unprecedented scale. They raised concerns over the way the environmental clearances were issued, demanding that they be revoked and a fresh, rigorous environmental impact assessment conducted by the Union government, along with public consultations, both of which have currently been bypassed. They allege that the environmental clearance was granted in a rushed manner without transparency, while overruling the fact that 90% of one of the sites overlaps with a reserve forest.
While initially announced as a 1 gigawatt AI data centre project by Google, environmental clearances were issued to two Special Purpose Vehicles (SPV) owned by Adani Infra, by the State Environment Impact Assessment Authority (SEIAA) of Andhra Pradesh on April 18. Together, the two data centre parks will need around 500 kilolitres of water per day.
The project was placed under Category B2 of the Union government’s Environmental Impact Assessment Notification, 2006, which means it doesn’t require environmental clearance from the Union government but only the state-level authority, the SEIAA. The categorisation also means the massive project will not need an Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) or a public consultation. Activists say this classification has been done despite its proximity to the Kambalakonda Wildlife Sanctuary, which they say would warrant reclassification to Category A and intervention from the Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC).
The EIA categorisation of projects is based on the area they occupy, and their potential impacts on human health and natural resources. In a statement issued on April 27, a day ahead of the foundation laying ceremony, the civil rights organisation Human Rights Forum (HRF) raised concern that a project of unprecedented scale has been given environmental clearance without a rigorous, transparent appraisal of its “water use, air pollution, ecological impact, hazard risks and climate implications.”
Speedy environmental clearance
The Chandrababu Naidu government had announced a huge 1 gigawatt AI data centre along the Visakhapatnam coast along with Google in October 2025. Environmental activists have since expressed concerns about its impacts on groundwater and the climate in a city like Vizag which is already facing water stress.
The state government had initially allotted 480 acres for the data centre announced by Google, to be built in partnership with the Adani Group and Airtel with a capacity of 1 gigawatt. The allotment has since gone up to 601.4 acres.
The land has been allotted in the name of three Special Purpose Vehicles (SPV) fully owned by Adani Infra (India) Limited – Vizag Hyperscale Data Center Park Limited (in Adavivaram, and Mudasarlova, Visakhapatnam district), Vizag Mega Data Center Park Limited (in Tarluvada village, Visakhapatnam district) and the Vizag Rambilli Data Center Park Limited (in Rambilli village, Anakapalli district).
The two SPVs had applied for environmental clearance online on April 9. Their proposals were discussed at a meeting with the State Level Expert Appraisal Committee (SEAC) the next day, on April 10, attended by representatives of the SPVs and of a private environment consultancy firm hired by them, Pridhvi Envirotech. Environmental clearances were granted to both projects on April 18.
The SEIAA is constituted under the EIA Notification 2006 and is empowered to grant environmental clearances. The SEAC assists the SEIAA by scrutinising projects and forwarding its recommendations for taking a decision on granting environmental clearance.
Now, the SEIAA has granted environmental clearance (EC) to two of them (in Tarluvada and Rambili), under the provision of the EIA Notification 2006.
Retired IAS officer EAS Sarma, who has served as the Secretary to the Government of India in the various Ministries, said that the clearances were granted in a rushed manner, leaving little time for the SEAC to do a meaningful appraisal of such a huge project.
Under the EIA notification 2006, projects can be placed under Category A, which are referred to the Union government for environmental clearance, and Category B, which are referred to the state-level authority, depending on their size and potential impact. Further, Category B1 projects require an Environmental Impact Assessment report, which Category B2 projects do not. Public consultations are also mandatory only for Category A and B1 projects.
The data centre project has been placed under Category B2, Schedule 8(a), building and construction projects with a built-up area of under 1.5 lakh sq mts. Both the data centre parks each have a built-up area of just under this figure, according to the documents granting environmental clearance.
“States sometimes try to classify projects under Category B to avoid sending them for clearance to the Union government, since the appraisal there tends to be more objective. The state-level authorities are nominated by the Chief Minister, and by-and-large aren’t very independent. When states want to get clearances for projects very quickly, they somehow classify it under Category B and ask the SEIAA to clear it,” Sarma said.
But in the case of the Tarluvada, the SEIAA’s clearance itself acknowledges that nearly 90% of the proposed project site falls under the Pedda Chukka Konda Reserve Forest. However, it overrules this by citing a “Survey of India topo sheet”, saying “no forest is indicated within the proposed land.” The Visakhapatnam Divisional Forest Officer (DFO) has issued a no-objection certificate for this land, according to the SEIAA.
At the same time, the clearance also mentions that the Kambalakonda Wildlife Sanctuary is located at a distance about 1.53 km from Phase-I of the proposed project at Tarluvada.
Sarma pointed out that under the EIA Notification 2006, there is a condition that any Category B project, if located even partly within 10 km from a protected wildlife area or eco-sensitive area, must be treated as Category A, warranting appraisal from the Union Environment Ministry.
He has written to Union MoEF&CC Secretary Tanmay Kumar, asking the Ministry to urgently direct the AP government to “pose the project for appraisal as a Category A project and, meanwhile, defer any work on the project till such an appraisal has been carried out and the statutory processes gone through properly.”
Sarma also said that a topo sheet alone cannot be cited to invalidate that the site could be a deemed forest. He also noted that the data centres are expected to consumer huge amounts of water and power resources, while generating few low-income jobs for local residents.
Together, the two data centre parks have a total water requirement of 501 kilolitres per day (KLD) – 446 KLD of fresh water, and 55 KLD of recycled water. The water will come from the state Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Department. They will also generate around 172 KLD of wastewater, which will be treated in Common Effluent Treatment Plants (CETP) or Sewage Treatment Plants (STPs) and is proposed to be used for toilet flushing and gardening.
“Far from delivering any meaningful employment, these figures expose how little these projects offer in return for their vast footprint, marked by, among other things, enormous water and energy consumption,” HRF said in its statement.
The two clearances “are not independent assessments but identical, template-based submissions reproduced across projects and approved without meaningful scrutiny,” the organisation said.
Their classification under Category B2 “removes the requirement of a full EIA report, the need for Scoping and Terms of Reference, the requirement of a statutory Public Hearing at or near the project site, and any structured opportunity for residents to ask questions, or place their concerns on record,” it said, calling for their reclassification and fresh appraisal through full Environmental Impact Assessments, along with statutory public hearings conducted in all affected villages.
Heavy subsidies
The combined power requirement of the two data centre parks is estimated to be around 1,626 MW, along with backup power of over 350 diesel generators with a total capacity of around 971.5 MW. While the source of power is mentioned as the Transmission Corporation of Andhra Pradesh (APTRANSCO), the Andhra Pradesh government is reportedly set to give out discom licenses to private firms requiring more than 300 MW of power.
Apart from the huge amount of subsidies already provided to data centres by the Union government and the AP government, this means that state discoms will also lose out on revenue from supplying power to these projects, said EAS Sarma.
The Union government in its Budget 2026 announced a tax holiday till 2047 for foreign cloud service providers operating through India-based data centre infrastructure. The Andhra Pradesh government has also announced major land, water, electricity and tax subsidies for the Google Adani AI data centre.
Based on requests from Adani Infra, the state Information Technology department also granted a few other relaxations according to a government order dated April 17. Among these, the order says, “Necessary clearance from [Kambalakonda] Wildlife Sanctuary and Nuclear Submarine port (Project Varsha) for all three [data centre park] sites as applicable, shall be facilitated by the Government.” Project Varsha is a nuclear submarine base of the Indian Navy located near Rambilli.
In return, the environmental clearance imposed few conditions on the Adani Group, such as compliance with solid waste and e-waste management rules, treatment of effluents, installing solar energy systems on one-third of the roof, etc. and “avenue plantation along the approach roads leading to the proposed project site.”