Band member raises concerns about proposed data centre in Regina near urban lands
CBC
One member of a Cree/Saulteaux community is raising concerns and asking questions about a proposed data centre near their urban reserve lands in Regina.
George Gordon First Nation purchased 233 hectares of land near the University of Regina and Saskatchewan Polytechnic in 2019. Documents recently filed with the Rural Municipality of Sherwood show Bell Canada has plans to build an AI data centre near those lands.
Janna Pratt, an activist who lives in Regina but is from George Gordon First Nation, shared the pros and cons of data centres on her social media to get community members' opinions.
“I was one of those people that did go to Standing Rock to protest on how important water is and that is a major concern of mine,” said Pratt.
Data centres require a lot of water for their cooling systems.
In the documents submitted earlier this month, the water sources for the proposed facility weren't specified.
Pratt said the city's primary water supply is Buffalo Pound Lake and there isn’t a whole lot of water to go around and wants to know where the water is coming from.
“Consultation needs to be a key process with the lands, to build a partnership together to protect what is out there, especially the wildlife,” said Pratt.
Pratt said the community needs to get together and have a conversation because a data centre for artificial intelligence is new to the area and people don’t know much about it.
Pratt said she used AI when she was sick at the hospital for what questions to ask to make sure she got adequate care from the doctor.
“It's about using technology in a very wise way, understanding that one question of knowledge is worth a day's water for somebody. It's crazy,” said Pratt.
Pratt said it's important people listen to elders and think about the future generations because “we have to make sure that we're able to keep this world clean and safe for them.”
The submission for the proposed data centre said it would be "critical digital infrastructure for research," and the campus could create an unspecified but significant number of construction jobs alongside technical, operational and support positions. It would be part of a Bell AI Fabric project announced in 2025.
In a statement, Bell Canada's senior manager of communications Morgan Shipley said Bell regularly engages with First Nations communities through established processes but did not specify what consultations it had with George Gordon First Nation.
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