N.S. to host massive $10B data centre to power AI

This site could be the home of a massive data center, the first of its kind in Nova Scotia. Land is being cleared and construction is expected to begin before winter. Everwind Fuels says it plans to build the facility and lease it to the artificial intelligence company behind Claude. Our plan is to bring the investment and then bring the power. Vichy says his company is raising $8 billion of private capital to build the data center, another $2 billion, to build four of the wind farms that it's been planning for several years. Artificial intelligence giant Anthropic has signed a lease for the first phase of the data center for at least 20 years. It says it will use the computing power for its AI assistant. This is investment that is in the ground here, supporting Nova Scotia's, not only its energy economy, but its knowledge economy as well. Everwind Fuels says eventually its own wind farms will power the data centre. But to begin, it will need to get all of its electricity from the provincial grid. The grid operator says it always studies projects to make sure the grid can handle them before allowing them to connect. Politicians from every level of government were at Friday's announcement, enthusing about the project. We're genuinely interested, of course, in building a stronger Nova Scotia with the Premier and with his government. Today is an example of how we're building a stronger Canada. Please don't stop. Keep moving. We'll be here to support you in that. But this is a piece to the puzzle in what is possible for our province. We're hearing about potential construction and long-term employment, opportunities for local businesses, and infrastructure investment that could support future growth. But not everyone is ready to embrace it. There will need to be analysis and work that is done in terms of quantifying, I think, the impact on rate payers and understanding what the environmental impacts of the project will be. Everwind says it will pay for all the necessary upgrades to electricity infrastructure. It says it will keep water use to a minimum, and it says it has signed on to Ottawa's non-binding guidelines for data centres. Taryn Grant, CBC News, Pointe-du-Lac.