Brooks talks data centres; limited info available on megaproject proposed in Newell

Posted on July 16, 2026 by Vauxhall Advance

By Zoe Mason
Southern Alberta Newspapers

As the Alberta government seeks to exploit a data-centre boom, the City of Brooks is weighing potential benefits and drawbacks of joining in.

Around 150 people turned out recently for a public information session featuring municipal officials, industry professionals and experts sharing presentations and answering questions about data-centre development.

“Sometimes it’s difficult to separate the wheat from the chaff. I’ve heard some negatives and I’ve heard some positives, and I’m looking to try and understand what they really are and what they might mean for our region,” said Brooks economic development officer Mitchell Iwaasa.

A vocal component of the crowd objected to the prospect of data centres in the community.

In the United States, more than 4,000 data centres are already operating, and the communities that host them have raised concerns about water use, limited economic contributions and strain on the electrical grid. 

Earlier in June, Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew pulled the plug on a hyperscale data-centre proposal south of Winnipeg. He said risks to the environment were too high and the economic benefit too low.

“I reject the idea that we have to be slaves to surveillance capitalism in order to participate in the modern economy,” he told reporters.

In Alberta, 22 data centres are currently operating. But the provincial government is looking to capitalize on the massive increase in demand for data-centre infrastructure spurred by the growth of artificial intelligence.

The province released a data-centre strategy in late 2024. Former Minister of Technology and Innovation Nate Glubish said in 2025 his goal was to attract $100 billion in data-centre investments in the next five years.

In Brooks itself, any data-centre project would need to be relatively small to comply with local bylaws. But residents that turned out to learn about a mysterious project proposed in the surrounding County of Newell, where an application for a hyper-scale data centre has been in the system operator’s project queue since April 2025.

That project is slated for a capacity of 1,200 megawatts, which would land it among the largest data centres in the province.

The total capacity of the data centres already running in Alberta is 140 MW.

There is little information available on the proposed megaproject, including the identity of its proponent. But on the same day as the presentation, a preliminary sales agreement was announced between an unnamed applicant and the Eastern Irrigation District, which manages the use and delivery of water in the region.

The initial contract allows for the sale of two sections of land, equal to more than 1,200 acres.

Officials in Brooks and Newell County said no further information is available at this time.

Key concerns raised by attendees pertained to emissions, grid strain and the increased role of artificial intelligence, but the loudest complaint concerned water use.

Presenter Jay Philipsen, a data centre construction manager, says closed-loop systems that use a synthetic refrigerant are more common in Canada’s cold climate than the evaporative systems used in many American facilities, which can use more than 100 million gallons of water per year.

In Alberta, a facility using evaporative cooling may only need water for cooling when temperatures exceed 27 degrees, less than 10 per cent of the year.

While these systems lower the water usage drastically, they are less energy efficient.

Presenter Robert Henry, an engineer and partner with ASCENT Energy Partners, says the concentration of power lines in the Brooks area is a selling point for potential investors.

“That’s less of an issue here, because you are honestly in an electricity grid hotspot,” said Henry.

Legislation passed in December requires large load projects – defined by the Alberta Electric Systems Operator as over 75 MW for data centres – to bring their own generation.

That means all new projects, including the one proposed for Newell, will be required to either build on-site generation to power the data centre, or else secure a purchase agreement with the local power supplier and build a generator to make up for the electricity consumed on another part of the grid.

With surplus on the lines in southern Alberta, a project in the area could buy local power and build a generator in the power-starved north.

“Smart money would build a power plant in Grande Prairie and the data centre in Brooks,” said Henry.

The provincial strategy uses natural gas generation to create the extra capacity needed to power data centres.

Brooks Mayor Norm Gerenstein said he has yet to make up his mind about his position on bringing data centres into Brooks.

“Right now, I’m at a neutral position, because I’m still in the process of learning more and hearing from the citizens of Brooks,” he said.

Officials said there is no active application before either City of Brooks or Newell County administrators.

Brooks director of planning and community development Lisa Tiffin says the city is trying to be proactive about the possibility of data-centre investment.

The city amended its land use bylaw earlier this month to attach conditions to data-centre development permits, including evidence of an agreement with Fortis as well as a water consumption and disposal plan.

“Without these rules in place, we had nothing to control this sort of development in our city,” said Tiffin.

No bylaw of this kind exists in Newell County, but the introduction of such a policy is expected well before the application for the proposed project comes in.

After the initial construction period, the number of jobs produced by a data centre is limited.

Philipsen estimated a 100 MW facility would employee around 70 full-time employees, including electricians, security and engineering staff, technicians and logistics personnel, but the number of jobs does not scale up proportionately to the capacity of the facility.

Presenter Strahan McCarten, a vice president with data centre operator eStruxture, said it’s easy for an applicant to submit a project. As more information develops, he encouraged Brooks residents and officials to vet proposals closely.

“There’s a bit of a speculative, gold rush kind of nature to some of the projects,” he said. “Do they have any existing operations? Do they have any existing customers? Do they have any track record in Canada at all?

“I think these are good questions to ask.”