Time Energy, the renewable division of Malaysian telco Time dotCom, has launched the country’s first community solar project for data centers.

The company signed an agreement with AIMS Group, a colocation and Edge data center provider, which will be the first anchor customer, via the Community Renewable Energy Aggregation Mechanism (CREAM). The companies signed a Memorandum of Understanding for an initial small-scale deployment.

The initiative works by allowing households to deploy community solar on their abodes and generate energy for corporate buyers, providing an income for participants.

“CREAM opens the door for any home to generate and sell clean energy to corporations,” said Arjun Arasu, CEO of Time Energy. “We look forward to bringing solar to more homes, so more people can be involved in helping Malaysia achieve its renewable energy goals.”

The agreement with AIM will allow landed households within 5km (3.1 miles) of AIM’s data center campus in Cyberjaya, Greater Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, to lease out their rooftops to Emit Solar, Time Energy’s solar division. As part of the agreement, Emit will install, operate, and maintain the solar arrays and aggregate the energy generated. Subsequently, AIMS will purchase the solar power generated to help power the data center.

“As a high energy consumer, we’re committed to decarbonising our data centres by incorporating more renewables,” said Chiew Kok Hin, CEO of AIMS. “CREAM gives us a new way to source clean energy while supporting community participation in the net-zero journey and strengthening our ESG commitments.”

In April last year, AIMS announced the completion of phase 2 of its Cyberjaya campus and announced plans for a third phase of expansion. The company, which is owned by DigitalBridge, completed construction on the 8MW Block 2 facility.

AIMS is headquartered in Kuala Lumpur with a data center presence in Kuala Lumpur and Cyberjaya in Malaysia, as well as Singapore, Bangkok, and Vietnam.

Previously a subsidiary of telecom company TIME dotCom, DigitalBridge acquired a majority stake in the company back in 2022.