CETIN Serbia has initiated environmental screening for a new 3.6 MW data centre in Beli Potok, extending Belgrade’s commercial digital-infrastructure market beyond its established concentration in New Belgrade.
The telecommunications-infrastructure company has submitted a request to Serbia’s Ministry of Environmental Protection for a decision on whether the proposed facility requires a full environmental impact assessment. The filing represents an early permitting step rather than construction approval, but it provides the first detailed technical outline of the project.
The centre is planned on 7,242 square metres of land at Kružni put Rakovica in the municipality of Voždovac, below Avala and close to the Belgrade bypass. The site forms part of the detailed regulation plan for the Bubanj Potok commercial zone, between the bypass and a planned railway line.
CETIN proposes a freestanding complex with 3,986.95 square metres of gross developed floor area. Its technological section will contain a basement, ground floor and one upper level, while the administrative section will rise to three above-ground levels.
The core of the facility will consist of eight separate data halls. Supporting infrastructure will include two transformer substations, an external area for diesel generators, underground fuel-storage tanks, a dedicated fire-water reservoir and the associated electrical, cooling, security and communications systems.
Maximum contracted electrical capacity is projected at 3.6 MW. That places the project above a conventional corporate server room but well below the hyperscale campuses being developed for global cloud and artificial-intelligence workloads. Its scale is more consistent with a regional colocation and telecommunications hub serving mobile operators, financial institutions, cloud providers, content platforms and large corporate users.
CETIN already operates a 3.5 MW data centre in New Belgrade. Completing the Beli Potok investment would increase the company’s combined declared data-centre power capacity in the capital to approximately 7.1 MW, effectively doubling its existing position.
The expansion comes as Serbia’s data-centre market divides into three segments. The state is building sovereign cloud, artificial-intelligence and supercomputing capacity at the State Data Centre in Kragujevac. Telecommunications groups such as CETIN and Orion Telekom are expanding commercial colocation services in Belgrade. Large companies and financial institutions continue to operate smaller private facilities or lease capacity from specialised providers.
Power availability becomes the central investment constraint
At continuous maximum demand, a 3.6 MW facility would consume approximately 31.5 GWh of electricity annually. Actual consumption should be lower during the initial occupancy phase and will depend on utilisation, IT density, cooling design and the facility’s power-usage effectiveness.
At an average utilisation of 75–90 per cent, annual grid consumption could reach approximately 23.7–28.4 GWh. At an illustrative delivered electricity cost of €90–€110/MWh, this would produce an annual power bill of roughly €2.1 million to €3.1 million, before the cost of diesel testing, maintenance and electricity-market balancing is considered.
Electricity will therefore be one of the facility’s largest operating expenses and a central determinant of pricing offered to tenants. A one-euro increase in the cost of each megawatt-hour would add around €24,000–€28,000 to annual expenditure under the indicative utilisation range.
The disclosed 3.6 MW figure appears to describe maximum facility demand rather than usable IT load. The proportion available to servers will depend on cooling, lighting, pumps, security equipment, uninterruptible power supplies and electrical losses. A power-usage effectiveness ratio of 1.4, for example, would leave about 2.57 MW for IT equipment at full facility draw. CETIN has not disclosed the design ratio, cooling technology or intended rack density.
Those figures matter commercially. Traditional telecommunications and banking workloads can operate at moderate rack densities, while artificial-intelligence servers using high-performance graphics processors require substantially more electricity and cooling capacity per rack. Eight data halls provide physical flexibility, but the centre’s ability to accommodate higher-density computing will depend on the design of its electrical distribution, raised floors or containment systems, cooling loops and fire protection.
CETIN’s application notes that the project will not generate high-frequency electromagnetic radiation. The more material environmental questions concern conventional infrastructure: emissions and noise from emergency generators, fuel storage, cooling-system refrigerants, water requirements, firewater retention and the prevention of fuel or contaminated-water releases.
The planned underground tanks will require leak detection, secondary containment and clear procedures for fuel delivery and emergency response. Diesel generators must be tested regularly even when grid supply is stable, creating periodic emissions and noise. The environmental authority must determine whether these exposures can be managed through standard construction and operating conditions or warrant a full impact assessment.
The location shifts digital infrastructure towards Belgrade’s southern logistics corridor
The Beli Potok site has direct access planned from the future Nova 5 road. A second connection will become possible after construction of Nova 1. This gives the development two potential approaches, although the reliability of access during construction and operation will depend on the delivery sequence of the surrounding commercial-zone infrastructure.
Proximity to the Belgrade bypass offers advantages for equipment deliveries and emergency access while avoiding the denser traffic of central Belgrade. The location also creates physical separation from CETIN’s existing New Belgrade facility, improving geographic redundancy for tenants that require data replication across two metropolitan sites.
Geographic separation only becomes commercially valuable when the facilities also have independently routed power and fibre connections. Two data centres can be kilometres apart yet remain exposed to a common substation, transmission route or fibre corridor. The environmental filing does not disclose the proposed distribution-system connection, backup feeder arrangement or external optical routes.
CETIN’s existing network provides a strong starting position. The company reports approximately 9,700 kilometres of fibre-optic network, 2,700 points of presence and 2,800 microwave links in Serbia. Its infrastructure carries around 1,450 terabytes of data daily and has international interconnection points in Frankfurt, Amsterdam, Vienna, Budapest and Sofia.
That network allows CETIN to develop the Beli Potok facility as more than a building offering server space. Colocation economics improve when customers can purchase cross-connects, internet transit, private circuits, cloud connectivity, cybersecurity and managed support through the same infrastructure provider.
Carrier neutrality will be important. CETIN describes its existing centre as open to international and domestic operators, financial institutions, content providers and digital-service companies. Maintaining that model at Beli Potok would broaden the potential tenant base beyond companies already using Yettel-related infrastructure.
The location between the bypass and the planned railway also raises a longer-term planning issue. Data centres are highly sensitive to vibration, dust, flooding, nearby hazardous activities and restrictions on emergency access. Final engineering will need to account for the commercial zone’s future build-out rather than only its present, relatively undeveloped condition.
A capital-intensive facility with limited direct employment
Only six permanent employees are envisaged in the documentation. The modest headcount is not unusual for an automated data centre, where security, building management, power, cooling and fire systems are monitored continuously but require relatively few on-site staff.
The employment figure also clarifies the project’s economic character. This is capital-intensive infrastructure, not a conventional business park development expected to create hundreds of jobs. Its value will be measured through digital-service capacity, tenant investment, tax receipts, network resilience and the ability to retain Serbian corporate data within the domestic market.
Construction and equipment installation will produce temporary demand for civil contractors, electrical engineers, cooling specialists, fibre installers, commissioning teams and security-system suppliers. The larger and more durable opportunity lies in operating services: cloud platforms, disaster recovery, cybersecurity, managed infrastructure and connectivity.
CETIN has not disclosed the project’s capital expenditure, delivery schedule, rack count, targeted certification or tenant commitments. Based on prevailing Central and Eastern European costs for a resilient medium-sized facility, a fully fitted 3.6 MW data centre could plausibly require €25 million–€45 million, excluding unusual grid reinforcement and financing costs.
The lower end would imply a conventional colocation specification and phased installation of equipment. The upper end would be more consistent with extensive redundancy, higher rack densities, advanced cooling and a large proportion of the technical fit-out completed before tenants are secured. The final figure will depend heavily on whether the 3.6 MW capacity is installed immediately or delivered in modules as occupancy rises.
A phased build reduces initial capital exposure but can raise the cost of later expansion. Installing transformers, switchgear, chillers, generators and distribution systems for full design capacity at the outset requires more upfront capital, yet avoids disruptive retrofits once the halls are occupied.
Certification will influence financing and leasing prospects. Banks, insurers and multinational customers will expect evidence of power redundancy, maintainability, physical security, fire resistance, business continuity and tested recovery procedures. Declaring two substations and generator backup does not by itself establish Tier III-equivalent availability; the complete electrical and mechanical architecture must demonstrate that maintenance or a single equipment failure will not interrupt contracted services.
CETIN adds private capacity as Serbia expands state infrastructure
The Beli Potok proposal follows a substantial expansion of Serbia’s public data-centre capacity. The State Data Centre in Kragujevac commissioned two additional modules in April 2026, adding 8 MW and taking total power capacity to 14 MW. Public investment in the complex has exceeded €100 million, while a second supercomputer using Nvidia processors has entered operation.
The state facility and CETIN’s project do not serve identical markets. Kragujevac hosts government systems, sovereign cloud infrastructure, supercomputing equipment and commercial tenants under a state-controlled model. CETIN is positioned principally as a wholesale telecommunications and commercial colocation provider.
The distinction should support competition rather than direct duplication. Banks, operators and digital platforms frequently require capacity across more than one provider and location. A second CETIN site also allows the company to offer paired primary and disaster-recovery environments without placing both systems inside the same New Belgrade complex.
Serbia remains a small data-centre market by European standards, but electricity supply is becoming a limiting factor before demand is fully established. The country is simultaneously preparing additional state facilities, expanding supercomputing capacity and seeking to attract artificial-intelligence investment while retiring older thermal units and managing volatile hydroelectric production.
CETIN’s 3.6 MW requirement is manageable at national-system level, representing only a small fraction of Serbia’s peak load. It is more consequential at the local distribution level because a data centre requires continuous, high-quality supply rather than average annual energy. Connection terms, feeder redundancy, voltage stability and restoration priority will matter as much as the total number of megawatt-hours consumed.
The company states that its Serbian network is supplied with renewable electricity. Applying the same approach to Beli Potok would improve its operating emissions profile, although contractual renewable sourcing does not remove the requirement for physical grid reliability or diesel backup. Tenants with European carbon-reporting obligations will increasingly ask for auditable metering, recognised guarantees of origin and transparent allocation of electricity consumption to individual racks or halls.
CETIN Serbia operates within CETIN International, which covers Serbia, Bulgaria, Hungary and Slovakia and forms part of the e& PPF Telecom Group. Its shareholder base includes the e& and PPF telecommunications partnership and Singaporean institutional investor GIC, giving the Serbian business access to a wider infrastructure platform and potential group-level financing.
The environmental-screening decision will determine the next stage of the Beli Potok development. A finding that a full assessment is required would extend the preparatory timetable but provide more detailed scrutiny of fuel storage, generators, cooling, noise and emergency systems. A decision allowing the project to proceed under prescribed conditions would shorten the permitting path, though construction would still depend on planning, building and grid-connection approvals.
The disclosed plans establish a clear commercial direction: CETIN intends to turn its fibre and mobile-network position into a larger Serbian data-infrastructure business. The Beli Potok centre would nearly double its Belgrade power capacity, but its bankability will rest on the less visible elements of the project—redundant electricity supply, independently routed fibre, efficient cooling and contracted occupancy across the eight halls.
