Nice to speak to @geoffdembicki.bsky.social @desmog.com about leaked documents revealing the capacity of planned fossil plants for Canadian data centres + my estimate that if they became operational, they'd cause enough emissions to wipe out 15 years of progress
www.desmog.com/2026/06/11/m...
“The federal government could have easily said data centres have to be powered by new renewable energy sources. Instead, Canadians will get dirtier air alongside higher electricity prices, all so corporate CEOs can try to take away our jobs with AI.”
One of the lesser-noticed aspects of the pipeline MOU signed between the federal government and Alberta was the exemption for AB from the Clean Electricity Regulation, specifically to enable rapid AI data centre growth
If the high-end scenario of 15.5 gigawatts [growth in electricity demand due to AI] materializes, it could cause an increase of somewhere between 33 to 63 MT of annual greenhouse gas emissions, @ketanjoshi.co calculates, "effectively undoing the past 15 years of emissions reductions in Canada."
This is truly dystopic: Pokémon Go Scans Quietly Trained the Navigation Tech Now Headed Into Military Drones
dronexl.co/2026/06/09/p...
AI is fossil capital accumulation:
One of govt's stated top “public policy benefits” of constructing data centres is creating new markets for Canadian fracked gas producers, w/ build-out of vast electricity-consuming data centres providing markets for Canadian energy.
thetyee.ca/News/2026/06...