Councillor says city should consider how to regulate data centres

Well, it's been two years since the province announced a plan to attract data center infrastructure to the province, and now local politicians have questions about how these centers could impact our city. Ward Métis Councillor Ashley Salvador is planning to deliver a motion later this month looking at the city's options around regulations for large-scale data centers. Thinking about this holistically, we need to look at all of the potential consequences, trade-offs, and again, what is within our control. This is a conversation that's being had across jurisdictions, across all levels of government. Of course, there's a critical role to play at the federal level, provincial, when it comes to regulatory conversations. But again, I'm really trying to focus in on that land use impact at the municipal level, because that's one of the things that we are able to influence. Yes. You know, we've seen data centers for years now, but the transition to these large scale, hyperscaler style data centers, it's been happening quite rapidly. And it's really important that as a municipality, we work to get ahead of that to make sure that we are, you know, protecting our environment as well as the livability of our communities. Now, in the years since the province made this commitment, we've seen 22 data centre facilities open and operate across Alberta. What concerns do you have with that kind of a jump in growth? Yeah, it's a rapid growth. And of course, we're seeing that across the country. Here in Alberta, though, a huge, huge number of applications coming forward and proposed data centres. Of course, the concerns that I'm hearing, similar to those that have been shared with my office from constituents, water use, potential increases in utility rates, the amount of land that is being consumed by these large-scale data centres. And that's what the intention of this motion is, is to look at how we can get more information, do further analysis, and look at options to restrict and regulate the large-scale data centers we're seeing proposed. I would like to see consideration of removing large-scale data centers from our standard zones so that there's greater oversight and more conversation to be had about where these may or may not be appropriate. Of course, you know, there's economic arguments, but there are also environmental consequences that have a cost associated with them. I think about some of the projected utility rate increases that I've seen potentially adding hundreds of dollars to people's utility bills annually, just with a few of the proposals that are in the works right now. So I think we need to look at this holistically, not focusing solely on the potential economic uplift, but considering all potential negative externalities. We have also chatted with people or companies that are developing or planning to develop plans for data centers, and they talk about building in the infrastructure so that they can support circular water use, so that they can support that electricity generation, so that it doesn't have that local impact. Would that mitigate some of those concerns that you have? in the time and space where we don't have firm answers around what exactly that looks like and what mechanisms there are for accountability to ensure that that actually happens. I've heard similar things around, for example, closed loop or on-site generation, but ultimately until there are accountability mechanisms and transparency around whether that comes to fruition, I think those are the types of questions I want to be able to dig into and understand. The motion also asks for different options to be presented to Council around what tools we have at the municipal level and what levers are really within our control to influence the types of large-scale data centres that we're seeing proposed in our area. And I will also add, some of that analysis is also asking about regional impact. You know, how, beyond the City of Edmonton, how might regional proposals impact community members here in our neighbourhoods?