Olds residents battle massive AI data centre, fears over noise and health

In Olds, a central Alberta town of about 10,000 people, the fight over artificial intelligence has become a fight over what kind of place the community will be once the construction crews leave. Residents on the town’s west side say a proposed Synapse Data Center Inc. campus, paired with a massive natural-gas plant, would bring industrial-scale noise, traffic and emissions to land near homes and change the character of the town for good.

The project Synapse announced on Jan. 27, 2026 is enormous by local standards: a $10-billion, one-gigawatt AI data-centre development spanning about 2 million square feet. Company materials say it could ultimately be about ten times larger than existing data centres operating in Canada. The plan places the complex in the northeast industrial area near Highway 2A and Highway 27, alongside a 1,400-megawatt gas-fired generating facility intended to power the campus.

For longtime resident Marnie Desjardins, the proposal has turned retirement into a daily worry. Another resident, Janae Johnson, said she spends her evenings researching the project and sending emails after spending her days caring for her three children. Their concerns are being channelled through the Olds Transparency Project, a citizen-led group formed to push back against the development and warn neighbours about its possible effects.

The pressure showed up early in the formal process. By the time council met on Feb. 9, 2026, town officials had received about 45 emails from residents raising questions about noise, water, electricity, emissions, traffic and the approval process itself. That same day, council held a public hearing on Bylaw 2026-07, which proposed rezoning the land at NW-4-33-1-W5 from Future Urban to Light Industrial. Council later approved the rezoning by a 5-2 vote, even as residents and officials stressed that the hearing concerned zoning only, not the full merits of the data-centre proposal.

The power supply plan has already run into trouble. The Alberta Utilities Commission closed Synapse Real Estate Corp.’s Feb. 12 application to build and operate the 1,400-megawatt gas plant on March 6 because of significant deficiencies and non-compliance with Rule 007. Synapse has since reapplied. In a separate provincial decision, Alberta Environment and Protected Areas said the proposed data centre did not, for now, require a formal environmental impact assessment.

Town officials say public engagement will continue once an active development application is filed, and that review will consider noise impacts, natural-gas co-location plans and emissions modelling. Synapse CEO Jason Van Gaal has said the company is preparing a traffic assessment and other measures to address community concerns. But for many in Olds, the central question remains unchanged: whether a rural town can absorb a project built for the AI boom without paying the local cost for a future whose benefits may be felt far beyond its borders.