Bell Canada is set to significantly expand its planned data centre project in Saskatchewan, with the facility now expected to quadruple in size, Prime Minister Mark Carney and Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe announced Monday during an event at Canada’s first-ever investment summit.
According to Carney, the project is expected to attract more than $50 billion in capital investment, making it the largest capital investment in Saskatchewan’s history.
“It is the largest sovereign AI infrastructure network in Canada,” Carney said during the announcement, which was also attended by former prime ministers Jean Chrétien and Stephen Harper.
The expansion will increase the data centre’s planned capacity to 1.2 gigawatts.
The Saskatchewan government said in a press release that 300 megawatts of the capacity will be sourced from the provincial grid. The project will also include a phased development of up to 900 MW of additional capacity that Bell will provide through Saskatchewan’s “Bring Your Own Power” principle.
The development is expected to create up to 500 permanent jobs, along with an estimated 3,000 additional positions in areas including security, logistics and maintenance.
The investment also comes as Canadian authorities place greater emphasis on keeping sensitive data and digital infrastructure within the country.
“More and more, the information Canadians depend on, our personal information, our financial information, commercial information, it is being stored in these centres,” Moe said Monday.
“So I would say, as Canadians, we have a choice. Do we build the infrastructure necessary to keep Canadian data in Canada? Or do we leave our data sovereignty in the hands of other countries?”
The Canada Investment Summit opened in Toronto on Monday, bringing together some of the world’s largest asset managers and other major foreign investors.
The summit is aimed at encouraging investment in projects across several key sectors, including energy, critical minerals and defence.
