Companies behind proposed Lorneville, N.B., Data Centre to hold open house

An open house on a proposed data centre in Lorneville, N.B., will be held on Wednesday evening.

Residents of the Lorneville, N.B., community will get the chance to ask questions directly to officials purposing to build an AI Data Centre within the Spruce Lake Industrial Park.

The project would be built on a roughly 120-hectare within the industrial park, which was expanded after a lengthy rezoning process this past summer. It would be done in partnership between Beacon AI Centers (Beacon) based out of Calgary and VoltaGrid LLC (VoltaGrid), which operates out of Texas.

According to a joint news release from the companies involved in the purposed centre, power for the data centre would be drawn from an NB Power grid as well as through by-gas fueled power generation through VoltaGrid’s modular generators, which would be built on site.

“Data centres are critical pieces of infrastructure that enable a wide range of technology, including AI, cloud computing, and government databases,” reads the release. “An AI data centre houses thousands of advanced computer processors. Together they act like a supercomputer that can analyze massive amounts of information, allowing AI to learn, make predictions, and support new discoveries.”

The project is still pending an environmental impact assessment (EIA). If approved, the companies are hopeful to have the site operational by early 2028.

Beacon has not responded to CTV News Atlantic’s request for an interview. VoltaGrid president and CEO Nathan Ough said he would speak with reporters following Wednesday’s open house.

The City of Saint John also did not offer comment ahead of the meeting, but said Industrial Parks general manager Ian MacKinnon would be available later this week to comment on the purposed project.

Resident concerns

Wednesday’s open house is expected to see a number of Lorneville residents make an appearance to learn more about the first possible project that will go in their backyards following the industrial park’s approved expansion.

Adam Wilkins is one of those members and is also a leader of the Save Lorneville group, which has spent the past 14 months raising awareness about the impacts the expanded industrial park will have on their community. Among the top concerns are impacts on the community’s drinking water, a limited buffer zone between homes and industrial activity, and the destruction of one of the province’s oldest growth forests.

Wilkins says he is hoping for more of a townhall style as opposed to an open house at Wednesday’s meeting. He says this method would allow residents to receive a formal presentation and ask questions together, rather than visit different tables and ask questions independently.

“Now it’s up to the companies to see if they can actually offer real, meaningful engagement and provide information and respect the community,” says Wilkins, adding the city “dropped the ball” at every step of the way during the rezoning process of the industrial park. “Time will tell how that meeting will go this evening.”

This is the first purposed project to be announced for the expanded land of the Spruce Lake Industrial Park.

The city had previously touted there would be no “smokestack, dirty type industries” typically associated with heavy industry on the grounds.

“I don’t know how they’re going to spin it that this is going to be green and amazing,” Wilkins says. “It doesn’t seem possible that it can be what the city professes, and I think it’s just going to be that it isn’t, but [the city] wants that tax money.”

The Save Lorneville group has submitted a judicial review of the process to rezone the area of the Spruce Lake Industrial Park on the basis city staff and councillors had already decided the industrial park expansion’s fate before the process began back in 2024. There is no timeline for when that process would proceed.

When asked if Lorneville residents would simply fight anything to do with the Spruce Lake Park expansion, Wilkins reiterated residents have never been against economic development.

One question he has is about the jobs the Data Centre would create, something the city has touted in the past. Wilkins doesn’t dispute there will be plenty of work during construction, but once the facility opens, he fears it could be a different story.

“There may only be like 20 jobs, 50 jobs ongoing when it’s done,” Wilkins believes. “Data centres are mostly run remotely and through more computers, so would it be even that many jobs?”

He says the community simply wants to make sure things are done right.

“The people in the greater community that are saying that haven’t been the people that’s been through this process and how unfair and kind of steamroller it’s been,” Wilkins says. “Everything that’s been done is just based on optics to make it seem like there has been that engagement, but there hasn’t been.”

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