Former cannabis growing facility pitched as new AI data hub

A former cannabis growery in Saskatoon is being considered as a potential site for a new artificial intelligence data centre.

“I think Saskatchewan has a lot of strengths in terms of becoming a hub for data centers in Canada. Certainly we have, again, the talent, the AI research happening here. Obviously, the cold weather helps with keeping these units cold, or can help,” Alex Fallon, founder of Artificial Intelligence Saskatchewan (AISask), said.

An open house was hosted at a former cannabis growing facility, which a number of organizations are hoping to turn into an AI data centre.

AI data centres are facilities that store the technology used to power artificial intelligence. While AI might seem quick and simple for users accessing the technology on their smartphones, it actually takes a significant amount of space and energy.

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“It’s probably the most challenging piece of the puzzle, as this sector is getting built out. The energy demands, in particular with training-base data centers, are significant,” Christian Boyle, CEO of Shapeshift Development, said.

Boyle went on to express that while a facility of this size would be considered smaller in comparison to existing AI data centres, it would still require a significant amount of power.

This space is being eyed up thanks to the surprising similarities between growing cannabis and storing data. The facility was created to grow and study cannabis before it was legal, which means it was built to be incredibly secure.

“It’s built like a fortress because of that. So, eight-inch concrete walls throughout, eight-inch concrete ceiling, 16-inch concrete floors so that they wouldn’t dig in, that was the big worry,” said Mike Walch, a senior sales associate with Colliers Saskatoon Brokerage.

“With growing cannabis, it was all grown with halogen lights, which required massive amounts of power and massive amounts of cooling.”

While AI is used by a significant number of Canadians, most of the information about how they’re interacting with these large language models is actually stored out of country.

“So your data is actually living on in giant data centers, generally in the United States. With businesses becoming more reliant on data to power their workflows in institutions like health care, and utilities starting to use it to power the operations, we need to manage the risk of having all of the data secured in another country,” Boyle said.

The CEO went on to express that an added layer of data security involves having that information stored in a location that can be accessed in the same country it is being used in.

“We need to start thinking about how to onshore that data. And that is sovereign compute, so that if a geopolitical situation were to arise which would threaten our ability to access that data, we can mitigate that risk because it’s onshore, in our own country,” Boyle said.

Wednesday’s open house was intended to showcase the idea to potential investors.

While the facility has the bones for data storage, it will require a retrofit and someone to oversee the operation.

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