The eyes of the global technology industry could soon be turning to the Town of Olds.
Jason van Gaal, Founder and CEO of Synapse Data Center, announced the company’s intentions on Tuesday, January 27th to construct Canada’s largest data centre in north east Olds along Highways 27 and 2-A. van Gaal says “the not so known component where all the computers and servers that run those services – that a lot of us use – are situated. The backbone of the internet. So, yeah, that is what we would be constructing. In this specific case it is a larger facility – I think in Canada it is about ten times bigger than the next largest facility. It is a very large undertaking for Olds and for Canada.”
Synapse Data Center will be hosting a community information session on Thursday, February 5th on the Olds College campus. It will run that evening from 6 o’clock until 8 in Lecture Hall 316 in Building #2 of the Werklund Agriculture and Technology Center.
He says customers for the proposed one-gigawatt facility are expected to be some of the largest technology companies in the world and they could be moving in and utilizing it as early as mid-2026. There would also be an attached 1.4 gigawatt natural gas facility. van Gaal notes that Alberta is very well situated to become this nation’s AI super hub for these facilities thanks to the abundance of available liquid energy. He says “it is really a requirement of being able to build these facilities quickly to support kind of the rapid growth in AI (artificial intelligence) demand. In terms of Olds, the Town of Olds is very forward looking. I believe Olds has a history of kind of early adoption and getting on early technology trends as they did with their gigawatt fibre line I remember years ago and I think this kind of adoption of this project by the Town of Olds is going to assist with carrying forward that early adopter mentality.”
In total, he points out that it is a $10 billion dollar project. van Gaal says “in terms of jobs, the intention is to create in excess of 1,000 full-time jobs. 2,000 or more construction jobs that would last for a year or two as the project is being created. Industry data from TWC suggests that additional 7,000 jobs – residual jobs or indirect jobs – would also be created as a part of the project.” Ten 200,000 square foot buildings will be going up as part of the project.
Listen to 96.5 The Ranch’s Community Hotline conversation with Jason van Gaal.
