On October 22, an investigative report by The Guardian thrust Google's AI data center project in Finland into the spotlight: to advance its €13 billion Finnish AI infrastructure plan, Google illegally cleared around 400,000 trees at two sites in northern Finland without completing the legally required environmental impact assessment. Finnish police have now opened a preliminary criminal investigation into one of the sites, and the regulator's deadline for halting work is October 23 — today.
400,000 trees, two sites
The investigation points to two construction sites in northern Finland: in Muhos, around 330 hectares of forest and roughly 250,000 trees were felled, with topsoil stripped across large areas; in Kajaani–Otanmäki, around 200 hectares and roughly 150,000 trees. The combined figure of about 400,000 comes from a field estimate by Mari Annala, an ecologist with the Finnish Association for Nature Conservation. The project is run through Google's local Finnish company, Tuike Finland Oy, which Google describes as its largest single investment in Europe.
The regulator had already acted on October 6
The halt did not begin today. Finland's licensing and supervisory authority (LVV) sent its letter as early as October 6, finding that the project had cleared forest and started work without completing the statutory environmental impact assessment (EIA), and ordering all environment-altering preparatory works to stop by October 23 at the latest. The Guardian's October 22 investigation added new developments: satellite imagery, a public petition, and the preliminary criminal investigation into illegal logging that police opened after a citizen's report. A petition for tighter data center oversight, signed by more than 93,000 people, has crossed the Finnish parliament's 50,000-signature threshold.
Google apologized — but the trouble isn't over
Antti Järvinen, Google's country manager for Finland, has publicly apologized, saying the company acted "on its best understanding of the law at the time" and pledging to replant 130 hectares of forest in Muhos; spokesperson Sondre Ronander also confirmed to AFP and the Finnish Broadcasting Company that Google will comply with the LVV's instructions. But the apology has not ended the affair: timber deemed illegal has been barred from sale to mills, and UPM and Metsä Group have suspended purchases; the outcome of the criminal investigation will determine whether anyone is held legally accountable.
The compliance lesson for data center siting
This is a wake-up call for every player in the AI infrastructure race: the compute contest is not only about chips and power, but also about the compliance basics of acquiring land and breaking ground. In Europe, the environmental impact assessment is a precondition for construction, not a ticket to be bought afterwards; when legal due diligence at the siting stage is missing, the time saved gets paid back many times over in shutdowns, investigations and reputational damage. As AI infrastructure investment reaches the hundred-billion scale, the next things to watch are whether the LVV imposes further penalties and where the police investigation goes — both will directly determine the timeline of this €13 billion project.
