Malaysia wants to splash out on tech sector, but heavy water demand hard to quench
- The country’s water crisis could worsen due to huge demand for the resource from data centres and chip manufacturers, analysts say
In the past three years, Malaysia has secured billions of dollars worth of new semiconductor and data centre investments. According to some analysts, Malaysia is projected to become a major player in the global data centre space by the end of the decade.
But tech facilities like semiconductor factories and data centres need voluminous levels of treated water in particular to maintain their stringent production standards and efficient operations.
“We need new streams, new taps,” said Charles Santiago, head of the National Water Services Commission, referring to new sources of water.
“We can’t depend on the old taps because they are uncertain right now … you don’t know if there is going to be too much or too little rain, and droughts have become longer.”