AI is transforming Canada’s infrastructure development—and not for the better

Under-resourced municipal governments have been largely left to fend for themselves as they try to regulate the build-out of massively energy-intensive data centre facilities.

AI and Digital Innovation Minister Evan Solomon. The federal framework on data centre development is particularly guilty of seeming more concerned with attracting and enabling investment, while only gesturing to vague environmental and community protections, write Simon Enoch and Rachel Pettigrew. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

Opinion

BY SIMON ENOCH, RACHEL PETTIGREW

October 7, 2026

A new political issue is making many Canadians uneasy: the build-out of the “backbone” of the AI-driven economy—data centres, and the energy systems that power them. This is transforming Canada’s key economic and industrial infrastructure, creating headaches for comm...

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