Dear Editor,
The early July announcement from Premier Smith regarding Meta building a hyperscale AI data centre in Sturgeon County should be a cause of concern for Albertans. Promoting the idea that Alberta welcomes a significant number of gigawatts of computing power potentially worth $100 billion to the economy, coupled with employment through 3000 construction jobs and 300 post-build operational jobs, sounds like a winning formula for the province and its citizens. Minister Glubish envisions Alberta as the place in Canada for private investment to build a thriving data centre industry, essentially because we have the natural gas available to ensure an uninterrupted energy supply to these non-stop technologies.
In her announcement, Premier Smith stated Albertans could expect about an annual return of $250 million derived from gas royalties, taxes and levies. It's estimated that electricity transmission fees could be reduced by as much as 6% or about $1.50 per month. On the surface, there are positives in this recent agreement. However, what is the cost to Albertans in the form of natural gas consumption, water usage, emissions, infrastructure and environmental consequences and will data centres return a net benefit to citizens? With Alberta currently earning $36 million-per-day in non-renewable resource revenue, it would take a week to reach the $250 million amount, which could likely be done by maximizing current pipeline usage currently being improved by Trans Mountain and Enbridge.
This one GW (billion watts) data centre will need lots of natural gas to operate. A centre this size may consume 150 million cubic feet per day, totaling 55 billion cubic feet in one year. Although the province has no strict fixed GW target, developers have proposed over 20 GW of gas powered data centres. Simply put, if even a substantial portion of the many gigawatts of proposals proceed, natural gas exploration will expand to meet the need. Increasing demand by a growing data centre industry will likely increase the price to Albertans to heat and cool their homes, as natural gas is an internationally traded product, subject to price fluctuations. A growth in carbons emissions should be a provincial concern if this industry expands in Alberta.
Premier Smith has assured the water consumption by the Meta hyperscale centre will not be a problem as the centre will use a closed loop, liquid cooled water system. Research indicates that indeed, a 70% reduction in water consumption is possible. However, risks in the United States with closed systems should be noted as they include, bio-fouling, corrosion,pressure drops and leaks. The water system itself consumes enormous amounts of electricity and natural gas to operate effectively. In reading various media articles and listening to interviews, no specific mention of the water needed for fracking gas reservoirs is added in the water consumption totals. Water is taken from lakes, rivers, aquifers and brackish water to be used to access over 80% of the natural gas produced in Alberta. A single well might use anywhere from 4 to 21 million gallons of water to free the gas reservoir and most of the water is not recoverable.
Premier Smith was quoted by the July 11th edition of the Edmonton Journal that Meta is a “responsible corporate citizen”. To ensure that Meta remains so, one can hope that effective monitoring by the province occurs. Before Alberta celebrates hyperscale AI as an unquestioned economic victory, Albertans deserve a transparent accounting for the complete benefits and costs: jobs, taxes, natural gas consumption, grid impacts, water requirements, greenhouse-gas emissions, infrastructure obligations and the long-term consequences of committing one-time use of our natural resources to a rapidly expanding industry. Is what we are getting in return worth it hosting hyperscale data giants?
~Don Cassidy