DESIGN & BUILD
Steel remains an integral part of data centre construction, used for load-bearing structures, server racks and cooling systems. With data centre construction having more than tripled in some parts of the world in recent years, steel is more in demand than ever before.
However, in light of recent developments, the industry’ s reliance on the alloy could be called into question. In 2025 already, the global steel market has become increasingly volatile in the wake of US tariff changes and the UK making the decision to nationalise its steel industry in April 2025.
With insights from leading data centre and construction experts, we examine if the data centre industry needs to move away from steel, or if it can learn to embrace the material in a new way.
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Confronting a changing global market Tariffs under US President Donald Trump’ s administration have inflated steel by as much as 20 %, forcing countries like the UK to scramble to make an economic deal to remove such increases. Elsewhere, however, this could make it more challenging to get steel or other materials delivered on time, leading to the slowing of projects and higher costs.
“ Meanwhile, the UK’ s move to nationalise steel production has so far avoided immediate supply shocks, but has kept domestic prices high in the absence of substantial subsidies,” says John Archer, Senior Deliver Principal datacentremagazine. com 173