BCE Inc's Bell Canada lines up 895 acres for Regina AI campus expansion
First reading starts a hearing process for Bell's conditional land purchase; Bell proposes up to 900 MW of additional power.
Julian Okafor
A conditional land purchase near Regina has put 895 acres of farmland at the centre of a proposed AI campus expansion, with zoning still to be settled. Bell Canada, the telecommunications subsidiary of BCE Inc. TSEBCE NYSEBCE, has conditional agreements to buy the land, according to an Oct. 7 municipal planning report.
The TSEBCE quote showed BCE shares up 0.64 per cent at C$28.21 at 3:21 p.m. EDT Wednesday.
Council gave the rezoning proposal a first reading at a special virtual meeting Wednesday, CBC reported. The municipal report says first reading starts public notice and a hearing; Bell would still need an approved detailed design and development agreement before any development approval for the additional land.
Bell's Sept. 14 expansion announcement describes up to 900 megawatts of additional power under a non-binding agreement with Saskatchewan, beyond an initial 300-megawatt phase. The municipality's calendar lists Oct. 22 as its next regular council meeting, but gives no date for the public hearing on this rezoning.
Rezoning Would Move Farmland Into Industrial Use
The Oct. 7 council packet asks for first reading of draft Bylaw 15/26, which would change the roughly 895-acre tract from agricultural to light industrial zoning. Draft Bylaw 16/26 would add Bell's concept plan to Sherwood's official community plan and amend its future land-use map. Neither draft sets a purchase price for the acreage.
The draft zoning bylaw says it would take effect only when approved by Saskatchewan's minister of Government Relations. Sherwood's planning staff also say Bell needs a fully approved detailed design and a development agreement before development approval, leaving a separate municipal step after the land-use process.
"Only the proposal of Rezoning, Conceptual Planning, and OCP Future Land Use Map updates are being reviewed at this time," the municipality's planning staff wrote in the Oct. 7 report.
The purchase agreements are conditional, according to the planning report, and a Bell project fact sheet says farm families would retain the right to crop unused land through a leaseback. The report assigns required upgrades to two access routes to the developer, with details to be settled at the development stage.
Taran Ulrich, a protest organizer, told CBC he was unable to speak at Wednesday's online meeting and criticized its format. Sherwood Reeve Ray Orb told the broadcaster that public consultation would follow the first reading. The Oct. 7 agenda calls for public notice and a hearing without setting the hearing's date.
Bell Proposes Gas Supply For The Expansion
The proposed 895-acre purchase would support a much larger power plan. Bell's Sept. 14 release says the existing 300-megawatt phase would be followed by up to 900 megawatts of additional power. That would bring planned power supply for the campus to a potential 1.2 gigawatts, before operating load or a customer contract is established.
The Bell project fact sheet says SaskPower, Saskatchewan's Crown electricity utility, would supply the first 300 megawatts. Bell says the expansion would instead use dedicated natural-gas generation funded by Bell and developed with an operating partner; siting and pipeline work remain under study. The fact sheet names neither the operating partner nor a power-supply price.
Bell's Sept. 14 release says the buildout would proceed in phases as customer commitments are secured and would require commercial agreements, permits and environmental assessments. The project fact sheet is more explicit: Bell says it will not start expansion construction before approvals and a commercial agreement with a tenant. Conditional land agreements therefore give Bell a site for growth, without establishing revenue from the proposed expansion.
At full buildout, Bell estimates total capital investment could exceed $50 billion, a figure that includes tenant computing equipment and related power generation as well as data-centre infrastructure. That estimate is a project-wide projection from Sept. 14, rather than a disclosed amount BCE has committed to spend on the 895 acres. The municipal report gives no land purchase price.
The Bell fact sheet says cooling is designed as a sealed loop with no routine municipal water use for cooling, while the municipal report proposes City of Regina water for domestic and fire protection. The same report calls for on-site stormwater management and a fully engineered drainage design before future development approval.
The Sept. 14 Bell release makes tenant contracts and a separate gas supply central conditions of its Saskatchewan expansion. Mugglehead's Oct. 7 coverage of Wyoming data-centre power contracting provides an earlier account of that sector's supply commitments.
Read more: Black Hills signs Google power agreements for up to 590 MW in Wyoming
The Hearing Date Is Still To Be Set
Land-use permission is another condition: Mugglehead also tracked requests to suspend work on Finnish data-centre projects on Oct. 7. In Sherwood, the planning report calls for a public hearing after notice to neighbouring landowners, and its draft bylaws still show blank dates for second and third readings.
Read more: Alphabet Inc's Finnish sites face request to suspend work at two projects
Sherwood's next scheduled regular council meeting is Oct. 22. Its published calendar does not place a Bell hearing on Oct. 9; the next dated check is whether the municipality has posted hearing notice and the terms of any further reading by Oct. 22.
