Largest AI data centre in the world to be built in northwest Alberta

[SebC]

Originally Posted by Mathgod

The reason why it's not green today is because of people like him hoarding his wealth instead of investing it in green energy R&D.

Isn't his wealth mostly Tesla stock? Not exactly capital (in the sense of an asset that improves productivity). If he sold it for capital then someone else would be down capital and up Tesla stock.

This is why I call the stock market imaginary wealth. It's not imaginary for the person who owns it but for the actual entire economy what matters is how many factories there are, how educated the workforce is, what technologies have been invented, productivity etc. not what the stock market claims all companies are worth.

[Fuzz]

Ya, but then you can borrow more money backed by your stock, so it's like having your cake and eating it, and getting endless free cake. Mmmm cake.

[Street Pharmacist]

Originally Posted by MelBridgeman

It's not that Musk is going to do it or even any of his companies, it's the fact that hes getting the ball rolling that humans next natural progression is inter planet.

But alas we can't have nice things but cause the babies whine about his wealth or his politics.

Yellowstone will erupt
An asteriod will hit the earth.
Those two things alone make our little co2 problem look like a drop in the bucket.

There isn't much we can do about it.

Here's the thing the interplanetary people ignore (this is getting way off topic, but if we're honest the entire topic is a one sheet press release), either of those scenarios still leave earth far, far, far, far more hospitable to life than any other known planet. Why leave when even an irradiated earth is safer than Mars?

[MelBridgeman]

Originally Posted by Street Pharmacist

Here's the thing the interplanetary people ignore (this is getting way off topic, but if we're honest the entire topic is a one sheet press release), either of those scenarios still leave earth far, far, far, far more hospitable to life than any other known planet. Why leave when even an irradiated earth is safer than Mars?

Working on Mars colonization doesn’t mean abandoning Earth. The knowledge and technologies developed will benefit both planets, and humanity can focus on multiple goals simultaneously.

While Earth may seem safer now, it’s about diversifying humanity’s survival options. A self-sustaining colony on Mars ensures that even if Earth becomes uninhabitable, human civilization can continue.

Colonizing Mars inspires technological breakthroughs that can improve life on Earth while preparing us for interstellar exploration, which may one day be essential for humanity’s survival.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by MelBridgeman

Working on Mars colonization doesn’t mean abandoning Earth. The knowledge and technologies developed will benefit both planets, and humanity can focus on multiple goals simultaneously.

While Earth may seem safer now, it’s about diversifying humanity’s survival options. A self-sustaining colony on Mars ensures that even if Earth becomes uninhabitable, human civilization can continue.

Colonizing Mars inspires technological breakthroughs that can improve life on Earth while preparing us for interstellar exploration, which may one day be essential for humanity’s survival.

If you can’t make an argument without AI writing it for you, then you’re probably not well equipped to make the argument.

[MelBridgeman]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

If you can’t make an argument without AI writing it for you, then you’re probably not well equipped to make the argument.

lol This is an AI thread bro. Go outside? Be happy? Geez

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by MelBridgeman

lol This is an AI thread bro. Go outside? Be happy? Geez

Just take the L

[D as in David]

Originally Posted by MelBridgeman

lol This is an AI thread bro. Go outside? Be happy? Geez

Pepsi should do that thing that he'd never be able to do on Mars?

[SeeGeeWhy]

Originally Posted by Azure

I mean assuming money and investment isn't an issue, what is stopping them from building off-grid natural gas power plants that literally only power this facility?

This, for one.

[SeeGeeWhy]

Originally Posted by wireframe

Four years ago this pretend project would have been a cryptocurrency mining center. It's only proposed now with a different title because the UCP are working hard to reward gas power generation and are giving money to companies to prove how conservative they are to other culture warriors. Can't hate on Kevin O'Leary for going through the motions.

It would not be the worst idea for the crown to take a stake in this in order to convert low value methane reserves into a 'strategic crypto reserve', much like the Bitumen in Kind royalty structure that was put in place to build NWR/ACTL.

It also aligns with the movements that are afoot for building nuclear here. One day, the free ride we are getting from excess SAGD cogen production will end, and it won't be pretty if we aren't preparing for that.

Interestingly enough, the Peace region is where the last twin ACR project had settled on as a location. Not for supporting potential data centre expansion, but to support development of carbonate based bitumen resource. That resource is still there, and it needs to be produced through electric heating (conduction or RF).

I've been part of teams who owned such assets and did some framing work on a pretty interesting concept to produce bitumen from the Leduc formation, and that ONE project had similar electricity demands (i.e. 40% of the total grid capacity at the time of study... FWIW, grid capacity was just north of 8GW at that time).

So... while somewhat plausible and attractive, it represents several complex megaprojects coming together, and that is what makes me skeptical. Even with intelligent, properly financed, morally sound, competent people with track records of executing will have a brutal time getting something like this done.

[BlackArcher101]

Anyone else see this article? https://nationalpost.com/news/canada...ing-in-alberta

Tidbits

With permits already approved, the land regulatory hoops jumped through, the investment adds up to “the lowest cost of energy with the most educated workforce.”

Which permits?

When Kevin initially pitched this $70-billion AI data centre project to big sovereign wealth funds in Europe, they told him nobody’s going to invest in Canada; the place has been tainted for nine years. His version of those conversations goes like this: “I said, ‘Guys, I’m gonna need 70 billion.’ And they said, ‘Where’s the destination project?’ I said, ‘Alberta, Canada.’ And they said, ‘Mm-mm-mm. They don’t have permits…. You can’t get them from Ottawa, everybody knows that.’”

Totally happened. But which wealth funds ended up funding this?

The Canadian Dream has been a nightmare for the past nine years, Kevin agrees, and except for some legacy businesses, he hasn’t invested anything in the country since Trudeau was elected. “I did what everybody else did,” he shrugs, “sell everything in Canada, take the hit, and move the cash out of there.” This, from a guy who calls Canada home.

But he’s had a change of heart. “Everybody is announcing a data centre with not a chance in hell of building it, except Alberta… If you can find a better spot in North America than Alberta, go there,” he says, “But you won’t.”

lol

Yet there’s more to Kevin’s pitch than an opportunity to capitalize on a devalued Canadian dollar. He’s boldly telling the world: Canada is open for business again. “I know Trump,” Kevin continues, “he’s a rational guy. He’s just starting to negotiate for NAFTA 3.0, that’s what he’s doing. I’ve told the staffers, don’t bother with Trudeau, you’re going to be dealing with a guy named Pierre. “The legacy of Justin Trudeau will be the idiot king,” Kevin asserts, his voice animated. “He’s a little mouse, running around the kitchen. His party has a broom and they’re going to get that little mouse, they’re going to get him pretty soon. And he’ll be gone. And then Pierre has to come in and start fixing.”

He'll fit right in to Canada again once PP is elected. Massive eye roll.

Every jurisdiction is competing for data centres — and associated high-paying jobs — Kevin reports, so when he got a call from one of Alberta Premier Danielle Smith’s staffers, asking, ‘Why aren’t you coming to Alberta?’ he replied, tersely: “Nobody invests in Canada anymore, you know that. You can’t get the permits. Justin Trudeau has shut you down.”

Kevin knew Alberta had lots of natural gas, but he didn’t know the 5,000 acres of industrial land in the Municipal District of Greenview — enough to site a $70-billion AI data centre — was already permitted. “Danielle Smith and the previous governments have been working on building an oil refinery there for the last 12 years,” Kevin explains, “and the permits also allow for alternate uses.” As well, the UCP government in Alberta had gone to court and won the sovereign right to decide what’s going to happen with energy in the province.

Interesting, first I've heard of this refinery. 12 years and no progress except some sort of permit. I feel there's more info to be dug up here. Was this land owned by the AB Gov and has been handed to O'Leary for this project?

Kevin’s next step was inviting Premier Smith on a “secret mission” — an unofficial visit — to Abu Dhabi to tour some of the largest data centres in the world, and meet with owners of the transformer makers. “You know, I said, ‘Listen Danielle, nobody believes you around the world. There’s not a sovereign wealth fund that will invest in Canada. You’re going to have to come with me on a plane. We’re going to have to fly around the world. They’re going to have to look you in the eye because no one wants to get screwed by Trudeau again.’”

“That woman (Premier Smith) is a firecracker,” Kevin laughs. “I was nervous because I’d never worked with her before,” he admits, “But wow! Now that is a leader…. She has to be let loose because she is a friggin’ hero and she is going to bring capital back to Canada.”

[puffnstuff]

Has oleary ever done big capital projects? I kinda have the impression he just imports crap from China and resells it, but ive never looked.

[SeeGeeWhy]

Originally Posted by BlackArcher101

Interesting, first I've heard of this refinery. 12 years and no progress except some sort of permit. I feel there's more info to be dug up here. Was this land owned by the AB Gov and has been handed to O'Leary for this project?

Hmmm... that might be related to the GTL project Sasol ultimately chose to build in Lake Charles, Louisianna.

But there were about 12 semi-serious refinery proposals being thrown around by oilsands developers around that time, which initiated the contest that ultimately created the BRIK rules and saw NW Refinery in Sturgeon emerge as the victor. All other proposals, including a partially built Voyageur, were canned after that happened.

My memory is super fuzzy on this, though. Can anyone else back me up?

[TrentCrimmIndependent]

Originally Posted by MelBridgeman

lol This is an AI thread bro. Go outside? Be happy? Geez

To be fair, outside is very cold and not exactly a recipe for enjoyment right now.

[SeeGeeWhy]

Originally Posted by SeeGeeWhy

Hmmm... that might be related to the GTL project Sasol ultimately chose to build in Lake Charles, Louisianna.

But there were about 12 semi-serious refinery proposals being thrown around by oilsands developers around that time, which initiated the contest that ultimately created the BRIK rules and saw NW Refinery in Sturgeon emerge as the victor. All other proposals, including a partially built Voyageur, were canned after that happened.

My memory is super fuzzy on this, though. Can anyone else back me up?

Ok, my bad. The Sasol GTL project was proposed to be located in the Industrial Heartland area NE of Edmonton.

That said, Alter NRG did have a Coal to Liquids project proposed near Fox Creek which is in the MD of Greenview.

https://twitter.com/user/status/1875268092282253607

Edit: There is also this Pembina proposed Sour Gas processing plant in the area:

https://twitter.com/user/status/1875273041065996379

[Slava]

Originally Posted by SeeGeeWhy

It would not be the worst idea for the crown to take a stake in this in order to convert low value methane reserves into a 'strategic crypto reserve', much like the Bitumen in Kind royalty structure that was put in place to build NWR/ACTL.

It also aligns with the movements that are afoot for building nuclear here. One day, the free ride we are getting from excess SAGD cogen production will end, and it won't be pretty if we aren't preparing for that.

Interestingly enough, the Peace region is where the last twin ACR project had settled on as a location. Not for supporting potential data centre expansion, but to support development of carbonate based bitumen resource. That resource is still there, and it needs to be produced through electric heating (conduction or RF).

I've been part of teams who owned such assets and did some framing work on a pretty interesting concept to produce bitumen from the Leduc formation, and that ONE project had similar electricity demands (i.e. 40% of the total grid capacity at the time of study... FWIW, grid capacity was just north of 8GW at that time).

So... while somewhat plausible and attractive, it represents several complex megaprojects coming together, and that is what makes me skeptical. Even with intelligent, properly financed, morally sound, competent people with track records of executing will have a brutal time getting something like this done.

I'm not sure what the point of a "strategic crypto reserve" is, though. With oil or a commodity like that, it makes sense because you have those things in case you need them for a particular use. What would the crypto equivalent be for the province?

[SeeGeeWhy]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

That’s why intelligent jurisdictions are planning for these things properly and looking into nuclear and renewables to ensure they’re sustainable. Instead, the UCP are just having it dropped in their lap with no plan while they actively undermine renewable energy.

Originally Posted by Doctorfever

What source do you have for these other intelligent jurisdictions looking into nuclear and renewables for this type of project?

DR. F, Pepsi is correct but it should be clarified that data centre developers and the jurisdictions that may host them are running into very hard limits and are taking ANYTHING they can get, not just renewables and nuclear. But it is notable that 2024 marked the year that big data started being openly positive towards nuclear. I think that's just part of the reality we are in now.

The last 5-7 years prior to the launch of LLM/AI tools gave us a hint with crypto mining growth and expanded use of data centers in general.
The successful early movers in Crypto mining (like $IREN) quickly gobbled up idle grid connection capacity on abandoned industrial sites. That did nothing to ADD generation capacity, but it did increase strain to the existing resources in our system, and I would say more importantly introduced a new competitor for kWh that is willing (and able) to pay a higher price than Joe and Jane Schmoe.

Big data center players who adopted ESG (MSFT, GOOG, Meta, AWS) made many overtures about being "100% renewable powered" by purchasing offset certificates as they grew, but that is Inshallah power and isn't real, so it has also been tapped. All of these players are now openly discussing driving investment in NEW power generation and T&D infra, even putting their own cash into those projects which is a major change in their MO.

Since LLM/AI has been introduced, the ratchet is becoming exponential. LLNL put out a very good report in December '24 outlining data center trends.

Their projections show the changing nature of data centers. The top 3 uses driving growth in energy demand are for AI Training, Hyperscalers, and AI Inference. AI Training needs 80% uptime, Inference needs 40%. Their forecasts show demand tripling from current use by 2028, from just under 200 TWh/y to 400 - 600 TWh/y. One AP1000 running at 90% CF will generate just under 9 TWh in a year, so we are talking about adding 45 - 70 AP1000 reactors worth of demand in 3 years. Insane.

It's really hard to tell how many of these proposals are being driven by the same a-holes taking a "spray and pray" approach to siting, but the effect is serious. Those four companies alone laid out about 88 Billion USD in 2024 on capex to expand their cluster capacity, and another 17B operating them. In ONE year.

Think about how fast our elected officials drop on their knees to fellate a project proponent offering to spend single digit billions over several years in Alberta. That means every single politician in every jurisdiction that contemplates project approvals on earth is doing whatever work they can to attract ANY of that investment for their region.

There is no coincidence that the Biden Admin announced a pledge to triple domestic nuclear generation capacity by 2050 last year. That's 200GW over 25 years, and we are looking at the prospect of half of that being spoken for in 3.

Microsoft has been talking about leveraging their internal AI tools in order to identify existing coal sites that would be suitable candidates for repowering with small modular reactors. They've also announced a deal that would allow Constellation to re-open Three Mile Island nuclear plant to power a co-located data center. Bill Gates is also head of TerraPower, who is actively constructing their FOAK molten chloride Natrium reactor in Keremmer, Wyoming, and don't think for a second that this is not related to MSFTs ambitions in this space (including their acquisition of half of OpenAI), or the "HALEU for AI-Regulation" trade off made with US Congress (my specuation).

xAI built diesel fired capacity in Memphis, TN.

West Virgina hosts something like 50% of all US data-centres, which is served by PMJ. PMJ is admitting that several coal assets that were slated for shut in will instead remain in service, as well as pledging support to help VRE developers Sunimoto-CEP to build 1.5 GW of Solar + Battery storage. Same article notes other places doing the same with their coal assets, and how Georgia Power (who just brought Vogtle NPP online) is courting data center investment hard.

AWS announced an investment in washington state based X-Energy, with additional commitments to take off power from the same. They're looking at an initial 320 MW project in Central WA, with a view to build 5GW eventually. They also did a deal with Talen in Pennsylvania to take off the power from their Susquehanna NPP (like MSFT's TMI deal).

Google chummed up with their friendly neighbourhood nuclear start up in Kairos Power last year to commit to building 500MW of nuclear capacity.

Sam Altman took his investment in Oklo public via SPAC last year. Prior to the "IPO" they were announcing SEVERAL Commercial MOUs for PPAs in places like Ohio, specifically to support data center expansion, but the huge splash came recently when they announced a move with DC developer, SWITCH, to build up to 12GW of new nuclear capacity.

That's off the top of my head, and doesn't treat the same things that are happening in other countries.

So yes.. there are LOTS of jurisdictions planning (read: scrambling) to make much more power available so they can capture data center investment. There will be redundant capacity built for many reasons, but I think the most important would be national security, and growing concern that nations will want to maintain domestic custody of such computing assets given the state of geopolitics and how nation-states are weaponizing these tools against one another.

And... count our lucky stars in Alberta... we've now got Mr. Wonderful and the Willow Park Wine and Spirit Magnates pushing for a really big build of data centres and new CANDUs in the NW quadrant of the Province.

[SeeGeeWhy]

Originally Posted by Slava

I'm not sure what the point of a "strategic crypto reserve" is, though. With oil or a commodity like that, it makes sense because you have those things in case you need them for a particular use. What would the crypto equivalent be for the province?

That's a very good question, and one that I am not yet decided on.

My sense, however, is that there is a connection between the desire for sovereignty and holding a crypto reserve. One that exists on an individual level, all the way up to the nation state (i.e. El Salvador).

When you've got a separatist undercurrent in our province, and a Premier willing to play to it, there is a non-zero chance that this gets seriously examined on the point of being able to tell Ottawa to F-off ALONE.

The less conspiracy addled point to make is that our gas trades at a severe discount to global best pricing. There are days we cannot give it away without paying someone to take it (wtf). Instead of bashing our heads in trying to get LNG to Kitimat, or KXL to Nebraska built, and getting nowhere, you build a massive data centre and consume the stuff right here, right now.

You end up giving a downtrodden but deeply entrenched and politically influential industry segment work (with subsequent taxation, local velocitization of currency, etc). You get to convert the discounted value of a GJ of Natural Gas into a higher value asset on an energy equivalent basis that is MUCH easier to stake/lever or liquidated and trade.

Pure speculation and spitballing here.

EDIT:

Ran some napkin math.

At current difficulty, 1 BTC takes an average of 266,000kWh to mine, equivalent to ~958 GJ.

Let's say Enmax Shepard has 60% thermal efficiency, you'd need about 1,600 GJ thermal from methane at standard conditions.

AECO spot price is about 1.59 USD/GJ, so you'd pay about 2,500 USD to mine 1 BTC. That 1 BTC trades for 98,255 USD... a 38x uplift in value on an energy equivalency basis.

So if you apply some of this BS math to reported resource estimates, it gets more curious.

Alberta's 2023 Natural Gas Stats fact sheet reports an estimated 1.373 trillion cubic feet of natural gas endowment. This is approximately 1,450 Billion thermal GJ.

Spot price as a gas commodity values that at ~2.3 Trillion USD... and if we could wave a wand to convert all of it to BTC without collapsing crypto or energy markets... that same heat potential would have a value of 89 Trillion USD!

[Azure]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

Are you unable to look stuff up yourself? We aren't your mother, if you think this is defensible and want to go on about it, find some facts yourself before taking the word of a blowhard snake oil salesman.

Trust me, I'm as skeptical as anyone.

But you fail to present any evidence as to why this will fail outside of some useless mutterings about O'Leary is a snake oil salesman.

Which he very well may be, and might even be with this.

And yet that is just speculation. On the other hand it looks like there may be more to this project than just O'Leary stroking his ego on television.

Which as a Canadian, I hope is true, because anyone with a brain, would realize that with abundant natural gas reserves, Alberta can deliver on power needs for insanely high power needs data centers.

As for your other mutterings about everyone else is going green to build data centers, you know damn well that nuclear is not feasible in 2025, both from a cost perspective, and from a NIMBY perspective. And yet because of the power needs Google, Amazon and others are trying to get the government to restart OLD nuclear plants. Because we know how well that will work.

End of the day natural gas can deliver baseload power needs at a fraction of the cost of anything else.

Wind & solar cannot do that. At least not right now. Funny enough, once upon a time I argued that they could, even on a much smaller scale, and you argued that they couldn't. Which was actually a good discussion, because it was the first time I ever thought about baseload needs.

[Slava]

Originally Posted by SeeGeeWhy

That's a very good question, and one that I am not yet decided on.

My sense, however, is that there is a connection between the desire for sovereignty and holding a crypto reserve. One that exists on an individual level, all the way up to the nation state (i.e. El Salvador).

When you've got a separatist undercurrent in our province, and a Premier willing to play to it, there is a non-zero chance that this gets seriously examined on the point of being able to tell Ottawa to F-off ALONE.

The less conspiracy addled point to make is that our gas trades at a severe discount to global best pricing. There are days we cannot give it away without paying someone to take it (wtf). Instead of bashing our heads in trying to get LNG to Kitimat, or KXL to Nebraska built, and getting nowhere, you build a massive data centre and consume the stuff right here, right now.

You end up giving a downtrodden but deeply entrenched and politically influential industry segment work (with subsequent taxation, local velocitization of currency, etc). You get to convert the discounted value of a GJ of Natural Gas into a higher value asset on an energy equivalent basis that is MUCH easier to stake/lever or liquidated and trade.

Pure speculation and spitballing here.

EDIT:

Ran some napkin math.

At current difficulty, 1 BTC takes an average of 266,000kWh to mine, equivalent to ~958 GJ.

Let's say Enmax Shepard has 60% thermal efficiency, you'd need about 1,600 GJ thermal from methane at standard conditions.

AECO spot price is about 1.59 USD/GJ, so you'd pay about 2,500 USD to mine 1 BTC. That 1 BTC trades for 98,255 USD... a 38x uplift in value on an energy equivalency basis.

So if you apply some of this BS math to reported resource estimates, it gets more curious.

Alberta's 2023 Natural Gas Stats fact sheet reports an estimated 1.373 trillion cubic feet of natural gas endowment. This is approximately 1,450 Billion thermal GJ.

Spot price as a gas commodity values that at ~2.3 Trillion USD... and if we could wave a wand to convert all of it to BTC without collapsing crypto or energy markets... that same heat potential would have a value of 89 Trillion USD!

Well, if the main reason is the push for sovereignty I’m 1000% against this. I think that angle is possibly accurate and probably the dumbest pursuit.