The USD $10 billion mindset: designing infrastructure for legacy, not just scale
At a glance
This piece explores a different approach to infrastructure investment — one that prioritises long-term community benefit over size or speed. Inspired by Tai Hollingsbee’s perspective on co-located data centres, it argues that even modest investments, when built with purpose, can leave a lasting legacy in the communities that need it most.
What would you do with $10 billion?
In a recent episode of Transform Tomorrow’s Thinking Today, Tai Hollingsbee offered a refreshingly human answer to that question. Rather than chasing the biggest or fastest data centre build, he’d invest in communities that could benefit from the ‘by-product’ of a project on this scale — tangible and additive social outcomes from co-located community infrastructure.
It’s a powerful reminder that infrastructure is about purpose as much as it is about performance. And sometimes, the most meaningful impact comes from investing in places — and people — that have been overlooked.
The perception gap: Data centres as extractive infrastructure
Data centres are essential to modern life. They enable public services to function, a kidney transplant to be delivered on time to a hospital, keep satellites in space and underpin the global financial system that lets us pay for our coffee on our phones. But despite their critical role, they’re often seen as resource-heavy and disconnected from the communities around them.
Land acquisition, energy consumption and water usage can create tension — especially in regions where resources are already stretched. Without clear community benefit, data centres have been being viewed as extractive infrastructure: necessary, but not welcome.
This perception gap is both reputational and structural. Infrastructure that lacks social license is going to be harder to build, fund and sustain. The demand for computing power is at its greatest in human history, and therefore there is urgency to rethink how — and where — we build.
What community benefit looks like in practice
Data centres built with community purpose can deliver meaningful outcomes across sectors:
Energy sharing
Demand based, energy sharing with nearby schools, heath facilities and manufacturing facilities coupled with renewable and energy storage system can reduce local grid constraints, deferring large capital expenditure to upgrade entire grids or substations, to support a new data centre.
Cooling and heating partnerships
Recovered heat energy from data centres can be redirected to nearby hospitals or aged care facilities, lowering operational costs for the community.
Integrated community facilities
Co-funded libraries, healthcare or education facilities as part of a new data centre project, can utilise economies of scale and procurement efficiencies of large capital deployment, to reduce new build cost to communities.
Integrated upgrades to water and utility infrastructure
Encompass community wide upgrades as part of a data centre project, utilising the scale and skills of complex projects, to lower unit cost of upgrades for the communnity.
Job creation
Complex data centre projects can train up localised workforce for the construction phase, provide skill development for the ongoing operation of the facility, all of which are transferrable to other sectors.
Digital inclusion
Onsite training programs, public access points and partnerships with education providers can help bridge the digital divide, giving communities access to tools, knowledge and opportunities.
Emergency support
Co-located facilities can offer backup power and connectivity during extreme natural disasters or outages, supporting continuity of care, communication and public safety.
The tide is changing now - why it matters
The ESG investment market has influenced the capital flows into infrastructure projects where communities are impacted. Investors are looking for projects that deliver measurable community outcomes on top of technical performance. Over the next two decades, an estimated $70 trillion will transfer from Baby Boomers to Gen Z — a generation that values transparency, sustainability and social impact. These are the investors of the future.
Governments are also shifting focus. Regional development, digital equity and climate resilience are becoming central to infrastructure planning. Data centres that serve communities — not just systems — are better positioned to attract funding, earn trust and deliver long-term value.
This is where the $10 billion mindset becomes strategic. We don’t need to change the entire industry overnight. Instead, we should be aiming to change the lives of the communities that need it most — and prove that infrastructure can be both high-performing and high-impact.
Designing for legacy
Legacy isn’t measured in gigawatts; it’s measured in outcomes. When infrastructure helps a school stay open, a hospital run cheaper, or a young person learn a new skill, that leaves behind a lasting legacy.
Designing for legacy means asking different questions:
- “Who benefits from this project?”
- “What impact will it have in five, ten or twenty years?”
- “How can we build in ways that strengthen communities?”
At GHD, we believe infrastructure should be resilient, regenerative and responsive to human needs. That includes the digital infrastructure shaping our future.
The call to rethink
We may not all have $10 billion to invest, but we do have choices about how we design, where we build and what we prioritise. Co-located data centres with community benefits are a blueprint for infrastructure that leaves a legacy. When we build with purpose, we’re not only changing systems; we’re helping change lives.