EDMONTON, Alberta - Facebook and Instagram's parent company Meta announced on Wednesday plans to spend over 13 billion Canadian dollars, equivalent to about 9.1 billion US dollars, on constructing its inaugural AI data center in Canada, which will also be the company's largest such facility outside the United States.

The new site is slated for development in Sturgeon County, Alberta. It will draw power from a natural gas-fired facility currently under development by a group that features Calgary's Pembina Pipeline Ltd.

Provincial Technology and Innovation Minister Nate Glubish described the initiative as a major opportunity for Alberta, noting that the region has established regulations designed to draw data center projects.

The province has actively sought large-scale data centers amid rising needs for AI infrastructure. However, the swift expansion of AI technology has raised worries regarding the significant electricity and water consumption of these operations, along with potential impacts on electrical grids and local areas.

Given that Alberta's power grid lacks capacity for several major AI data centers, officials are focusing on initiatives that include dedicated power sources, similar to Meta's approach.

Meta indicated that the data center will incorporate a closed-loop cooling mechanism to avoid using local water resources. Additionally, the firm intends to allocate 42 million US dollars toward community infrastructure improvements such as roads and water systems.

Just last week, Pembina Pipeline along with Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Partners and Kineticor Asset Management confirmed their move forward on the Greenlight Electricity Center project in Sturgeon County. Meta was named as the client on Wednesday. The power plant, with a capacity of 932 megawatts, is projected to start operations in the latter part of 2030.