Digital infrastructure operator CyrusOne (NASDAQ: CONE) and E.ON, one of Europe’s largest energy companies, have announced a Preferred Partnership agreement to design and implement local power generation solutions for data centres.

The collaboration aims to address the pressing issue of limited grid capacity and connection delays in Frankfurt, Europe’s largest data centre hub, and potentially extend to other locations across the continent.

The partnership’s inaugural project will focus on CyrusOne’s FRA7 facility, a hyperscale data centre in Griesheim, Germany.

E.ON Energy Infrastructure Solutions (EIS) will design a local power generation system, dubbed the E.ON IQ Energy® Center, to supplement the existing power supply.

This system is projected to deliver an additional 61 megawatts of electrical output to the facility by 2029, enabling the campus to offer an extra 45 megawatts of IT capacity to customers.

Consequently, the FRA7 campus’s total IT capacity is expected to reach 126 megawatts.

Matthew Pullen, Executive Vice President and Managing Director, Europe at CyrusOne, said: “We are thrilled to announce this Partnership with E.ON to provide customers with a runway to large-scale growth without utility risk by 2029. By leveraging the complementary expertise of both companies to scale innovative technologies, we are creating a unique opportunity to offer growth capacity for customers in their most important markets.”

The collaboration extends beyond power generation, encompassing grid support, power purchase agreements, and heat management. This approach seeks to provide near-term capacity for customers in crucial availability zones within gateway markets currently experiencing delayed access to grid capacity.

Marten Bunnemann, CEO at E.ON Energy Infrastructure Solutions, said: “This partnership brings together two industry-leading companies to accelerate a sustainable digital future, developing solutions that provide both power and cooling to the data centre and heat to the campus. What sets this Partnership apart is its strategic depth: a long-term alliance built on shared vision, technical integration, and real benefits for customers and the wider community.”

The FRA7 data centre is part of the FRANKFURT WESTSIDE campus, a 73-hectare commercial and industrial mixed-use regeneration project managed by BEOS AG and Swiss Life Asset Managers.

CyrusOne was selected in 2023 to deliver a data centre solution prioritising sustainability, capable of deploying up to 40 megawatts of waste heat to the campus heating network when operating at full capacity.

In an industry first, the proposed local power generation solution is expected to include a baseload cooling integration via absorption chillers. This approach is designed to convert exhaust heat from the power generation process into cooling for the data centre, potentially increasing overall system efficiency, reducing power consumption, and significantly improving Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE).

E.ON’s generation system is designed to produce power, cooling, and heat through a combustion process that qualifies CyrusOne to secure green certificates of origin, supporting its customers’ carbon neutrality targets.

While the plant will initially use natural gas, it is designed to be hydrogen-ready, capable of operating with up to 25% hydrogen blended into the fuel mix, with the option to transition to 100% hydrogen through upgrades where demand exists.

The local power generation system is engineered to enhance the quality and usability of the data centre’s waste heat by integrating exhaust heat from its absorption chiller, raising the output temperature by approximately 10°C.