With the increasing use of AI, companies have started giving priority to data centers. AI requires a lot of computing power, so it becomes necessary to build data centers to house large servers. Meta is now building a new AI data center in Canada at a cost of more than $9 billion. The facility, to be built in Alberta, will consume as much electricity as 800,000 homes — the same amount of electricity as a single major city.
**Meta is building its first data center in Canada**
This is the first time Meta is building a data center in Canada, bringing the company’s total number of data centers to 33. The facility is being built initially with a capacity of 1 GW, which can later be expanded to 1.8 GW. There were several reasons for choosing Alberta for this project: the region has abundant supplies of natural gas and the cost of energy is low compared to other areas. Additionally, the cool climate here helps reduce the costs associated with cooling large data centers.
**Controversy regarding electricity consumption**
Power consumption is the most talked about aspect of this project. Meta said the data center would require as much electricity as 800,000 homes. The company has promised to bear the cost of power generation and upgrading the power grid. However, there is opposition to this project; Environmental activists argue that the rapidly expanding AI infrastructure is putting pressure on natural resources. It is worth noting that apart from electricity, data centers also require a large amount of water. Recently, Amazon reported that its data centers used 2.5 billion gallons of water last year.
**Energy demand is continuously increasing**
As the number of AI data centers increases, the demand for water and electricity to run them will also increase. The International Energy Agency (IEA) estimates that by 2030, data centers worldwide will need about 945 terawatt-hours (TWh) of electricity annually. This is more than Japan’s total electricity consumption and twice the current consumption level.