Poland’s transmission system operator PSE is processing data centre connection applications totalling an estimated 150 to 200 gigawatts and has yet to sign one single connection contract. Investors who cannot read the gap between reserved and deliverable power are buying a speculative premium, not an asset.
The queue has become an investment product
The figures PSE spokesman Maciej Wapiński gave the Polish energy portal WysokieNapiecie.pl in August mark a turning point for the country’s data centre market. The transmission operator has so far issued connection conditions for data centres totalling roughly 6 GW. The applications still under review add up to an estimated 150 to 200 GW. Not one connection contract the legally binding stage that follows mere conditions has been signed for any data centre.
For context: the UK regulator Ofgem recently put the British data centre connection queue at “only” 50 GW, in a market operating many times Poland’s installed capacity. Poland’s queue exceeds any realistic domestic market size by more than a hundredfold. Paweł Olszynka, ICT market analyst at PMR, puts it plainly: in Poland, grid connection capacity has begun to “function as an investment asset”. What changes hands are plots and project companies whose principal value is not the real estate but the hard-to-obtain connection conditions. His second observation matters just as much to investors: “Nobody speculates where they see no growth potential.”
The issue has reached European level. ENTSO-E notes in its latest report that developers frequently file applications for several sites simultaneously or hold queue positions well beyond any realistic development horizon rational for the applicant, but distorting market signals and blocking capacity for credible projects. The European Data Centre Association calls clearing the grid queues the sector’s single most urgent unresolved problem in its latest annual report.
UC84: speculation is not banned, it is made expensive
On 30 April 2026 the amendment to Poland’s Energy Law known as UC84 entered into force the most comprehensive reform of the grid connection process in years. It does not prohibit speculative applications; it ends their effective cost-free status through higher connection-related costs and materially tighter deadlines for implementing issued conditions and concluding connection contracts.
Structural changes make the market more transparent. Operators must run public information platforms disclosing available connection capacity per substation, applications filed, their processing status, and rejected applications with reasons. Operators may designate in their development plans areas where the system is permanently congested there, new applications remain unprocessed by operation of law, so investors learn that connection is impossible before incurring project costs. Flexible connection contracts are introduced as well, allowing operators to impose temporary offtake restrictions instead of refusing connection outright.
The pressure behind the reform is measurable. According to regulator URE data, connection refusals already rose in 2023 to projects totalling 83.6 GW (up 63.8 per cent year on year); in 2025 a new record of over 107 GW of refused connection capacity was set – just before the reform took effect. The message for investors is unambiguous: pipeline value is shifting from “position in the queue” to “demonstrable delivery within tight deadlines”.
From paper to socket: where real megawatts are built
The distribution grids show how small the genuinely connectable market is against the queue. Stoen Operator, covering Warsaw and its region, currently has twelve data centres on the grid with just under 160 MW of contracted capacity; connection contracts for further projects total over 500 MW and connection conditions a further 300 MW plus. Energa-Operator has issued conditions for 19 data centres totalling 1,211 MW but has only two facilities of just under 5 MW actually connected. Tauron Dystrybucja has no data centre on its grid at all, but conditions for 448 MW and an application queue of around 1.4 GW. PGE Dystrybucja: 1.5 MW connected, conditions for 21 projects exceeding 123 MW.
The most interesting deals are being done precisely in this gap wherever connection capacity already physically exists. In March, Tauron identified five sites where the group intends to release 440 MW of connection capacity for data centres in stages through to 2035: Jaworzno, Blachownia, Łaziska, Siersza and Bielsko-Biała, all substations attached to the group’s coal assets. PGE is examining comparable models on its own land, pointing not only to infrastructure but also to technically qualified power plant staff. From industry, DL Invest provides the template: the developer bought the closed Fiat engine plant in Bielsko-Biała from Stellantis and plans data centres there with a target capacity of 200 MW the decisive factor alongside the building stock being the former plant’s existing connection capacity. A first 50 MW phase with an AI component is to be completed with Boosteroid by 2028.
This is the real repricing story of the Polish market in 2026: brownfields with existing connections former power stations, sites near substations, closed industrial plants are being revalued sharply upward against greenfield plots holding nothing but an application number.
Capital markets: the location stays small, the capital does not
Warsaw ended 2025 with 157 MW of operational capacity, up around 10 per cent year on year. According to Cushman & Wakefield the pipeline grew 45 per cent to nearly 160 MW, of which 11 MW is under construction and 148 MW in planning. That places Warsaw as a “Developing Market” in the 150–300 MW band against 11.4 GW of operational capacity across EMEA, 2.7 GW under construction and 12.1 GW planned. PMR currently counts over 20 planned new-build or expansion projects in Poland; cumulative investment from 2019 to 2025 stood at roughly PLN 5bn. CBRE considers a 500 MW market achievable by 2030, with other forecasts running to 600 MW.
The capital side is considerably further ahead than the grid side. European data centre vacancy fell to a record low of 6.5 per cent in 2026, with Q1 demand exceeding supply and pushing up pricing and competition. Colliers records record data centre volumes in its Q2 2026 EMEA Capital Markets Snapshot and a broad shift of institutional capital towards operationally intensive, platform-led strategies. Regionally, some EUR 5.8bn flowed into the CEE-6 markets in H1 2026, of which more than EUR 3bn went to Poland – its strongest half-year since 2018.
Regulation is shifting in parallel. In March 2026 the European Commission published a draft regulation for an EU-wide rating scheme for data centres, assigning energy efficiency classes based on PUE. Poland has yet to transpose the Energy Efficiency Directive’s waste heat requirements for facilities above 1 MW – the UC121 project has been on the government’s legislative agenda since October, but no draft has been published. The industry sees opportunity rather than burden: the Polish Data Center Association calculates that with the market expanding to 500 MW by 2030, roughly 19,700 TJ of waste heat could theoretically be recovered annually enough to cover around 16 per cent of Poland’s district heating demand by 2035. Poland operates one of Europe’s largest district heating networks; that is a genuine locational advantage once the obligation arrives.
What this means for investors
- Reserved capacity is not capacity. In due diligence, the procedural stage is what counts: issued connection conditions are a start, a signed connection contract with a delivery schedule is the actual asset. With 150–200 GW of national applications and zero contracts, that distinction determines value.
- UC84 will differentiate pricing. Where speculation costs money and deadlines bite, the premium for pure paper projects falls – and rises for sites with a robust, dated connection. Anyone who bought options on queue positions in 2024/25 should re-underwrite them.
- Brownfield beats greenfield. Former power plant, industrial and substation-adjacent sites come with connection, cooling water, land-use history and often local acceptance cutting time-to-power by years. Bielsko-Biała is the blueprint, not the exception.
- Efficiency becomes a valuation factor. With the planned EU PUE-based classification and Poland’s pending waste heat rules, technical design becomes a question of exit multiples, not just operating costs. A district heating connection for waste heat is a monetisable advantage in Poland.
This is exactly the intersection of real estate, engineering and energy where Prime East operates through its dedicated data centre arm PE Property Solutions: site and grid analysis before land acquisition, assessment of connection status by its actual legal quality, technical due diligence, and structuring of brownfield conversions in Germany and Poland.
Conclusion
Poland’s data centre market has two realities in 2026: a queue of 150 to 200 GW and an installed base well below 200 MW. UC84 will not close that gap, but it makes it visible and prices it. For institutional capital that is good news provided due diligence cleanly captures the difference between an application number and a deliverable megawatt.
Disclaimer: This article is for general information only and does not constitute investment, legal or tax advice. All figures are based on the publicly available sources listed below. Market data may change at short notice.
Sources
- WysokieNapiecie.pl – Grid speculators have fallen for data centres
- WysokieNapiecie.pl – A new grid connection queue, measured in gigawatts
- EY Poland – Grid connection reform under the Energy Law amendment
- PwC Studio – Grid connection reform: Council of Ministers adopts the UC84 bill
- Cushman & Wakefield – EMEA Data Centre Update
- Eurobuild CEE – Data centre market in Warsaw set to triple
- CBRE – European Data Centres Outlook 2026
- CBRE – European Data Centres Figures Q1 2026
- Colliers – CEE Investment Scene 2025–2026
- Eurobuild CEE – Capital flows back into Poland
- Bankier.pl / PMR – Over 20 data centres to be built in Poland
- PLDCA – Waste heat recovery from data centres (PDF)
- European Commission – Rating scheme for data centres: call for feedback
- Prime East – Warsaw hits the grid ceiling
