Energy Secretary Ed Miliband has said the impact of the rapid expansion of data centres on the UK's efforts to lower carbon emissions to net zero is "inherently uncertain".

Miliband made the comment in a letter to MPs who had expressed concerns about data centres not being mentioned in the government's plans to deliver net zero.

MPs have launched a new inquiry into the environmental impacts of data centres in the UK after receiving Miliband's letter.

Data centres are giant facilities full of powerful computers used to run digital services, such as streaming and artificial intelligence (AI).

The UK government wants the country to be a world leader in AI and is seeking to attract investment in data centres to achieve this goal.

But there are concerns about the large amounts of water and electricity needed to run them, including from gas-powered generators.

Dozens of new data centres, many funded by US tech firms, are being planned and environmental campaigners fear this could significantly increase emissions.

The UK government is under a legal obligation to reduce carbon emissions to net zero by 2050, after a law change passed in 2019 with cross-party support.

In his letter, Miliband said the government's modelling "accounts for potential emissions from data centres through our projection of overall electricity demand growth, which reflects broader economic trends".

Miliband said the modelling would "test a range of trajectories to assess the potential emissions impact under different outcomes".

It is the most detail Miliband has given yet on his department's approach to factoring in the impact of data centres.

The response was prompted by a letter from the chair of the Environmental Audit Committee, Toby Perkins, who asked Miliband whether data centres had been factored into net-zero plans.

His committee's new inquiry will examine how much energy and water data centres are likely to use, and how this could impact the government's net zero goals.

"But what kind of implications will they have for energy and the environment?"

The Labour MP said it was "critical that we really consider what the impacts of data centres will be before we charge into approving them en masse".

The Conservative shadow energy secretary, Claire Coutinho, said barring data centres from the UK "because of domestic net zero targets will do nothing to tackle climate change, but it will make us all poorer".

She added: "If we adopted a more rational approach we could have the benefits of growth from AI, focus our attention on exporting the clean tech the rest of the world needs, and protecting nature here and abroad. "

The UK government has been investing heavily in renewable energy in its bid to meet 95% of electricity demand with clean power by 2030.

But the rapid rise in electricity demand could make it more difficult to meet the target.

This month Ofgem, the UK's energy market regulator, said a surge in demand for grid connections last year had been "driven by the rapid growth" of data centres.

In a report, Ofgem said it was aware of 140 proposed data centres, which would require about 50 gigawatts (GW) of electricity – 5GW more than the country's current peak demand.

Friends of the Earth, a campaign group, said if all of those data centres came online, "they could consume more electricity each day than the entire country does now"

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