--- title: Stop the reckless expansion of data centres description: "Data centres are spreading across Canada : communities and ecosystems are on the line! Sign the petition now and demand we protect life not servers." image: https://act.greenpeace.ca/hubfs/AI%20Petition%20Preview%20Image%20English.jpg --- [![Greenpeace](https://act.greenpeace.ca/hubfs/raw_assets/public/GPCA-2026/landing_page_2026/assests/gp-logo%20copy.svg)](https://www.greenpeace.org/canada/en) En [Fr](https://act.greenpeace.ca/fr-ca/protegeons-le-vivant-pas-les-centres-de-donnees) # STOP THE RECKLESS EXPANSION OF Data Centres AI mega data centres are rapidly spreading across Canada. Land, water, energy, minerals, labour: communities and ecosystems are on the line.   Big Tech claims this is inevitable, but these projects can be stopped: by Indigenous nations exercising their right to say no, by residents resisting, by people like you who take action.   By signing this petition, you are supporting a moratorium that will pause data centre approvals in Canada and you’re with people saying: no tech expansion without consent, public consultation, and impact review. Sign now. [Sign the Petition](https://act.greenpeace.ca/en-ca/protect-life-not-data-centres#sign) [Learn more](https://act.greenpeace.ca/en-ca/protect-life-not-data-centres#learn-more) Sign Donate Share supporters have signed needed to reach 20000 You're a hero! Just one more question: Our work is 100% funded by people like you. We're completely independent from corporate or political donations. Will you chip in regularly to help protect and preserve the health of the earth? [$15](https://act.greenpeace.ca/en-ca/protect-life-not-data-centres?form=FUNGCJXWQWB&amount=15&recurring=monthly) [$20](https://act.greenpeace.ca/en-ca/protect-life-not-data-centres?form=FUNGCJXWQWB&amount=20&recurring=monthly) [$35](https://act.greenpeace.ca/en-ca/protect-life-not-data-centres?form=FUNGCJXWQWB&amount=35&recurring=monthly) I can't right now, but I'm keen to help Share this petition Every share helps build pressure. Pick a platform below. Facebook Twitter / X Email Copy link Bluesky WhatsApp ![GP03TTX](https://act.greenpeace.ca/hubfs/GP03TTX.jpg) ## Protect Life Not Data Centres **AI is rapidly reshaping the world. The technology may be new, but the system behind it isn't**: it's the same colonial model that we’re seeing at play with fossil fuel extraction and nature exploitation. And it’s about to hit really close to home again because **Canada is becoming a prime destination for *hyperscale* data centres that power AI.** The expansion strategy for tech companies is well-established. **It begins with land grabs and destruction, which, in Canada, often violates Indigenous peoples’ right to consent**—or to refuse consent—to projects proposed on their territories. \[1, 2\] To accelerate the process, tech companies deal directly with local officials. **Mega data centre projects are approved behind closed doors, without public consultation or impact assessments.** \[3\] The goal: to build as quickly as possible, at any cost. And the costs are very real. Once built, **these facilities consume as much water and electricity as thousands of households, if not millions.** \[4,5\] They gobble up freshwater resources, all the while many Indigenous communities across the country are denied fair and equal access to drinking water. \[6, 7\] Energy-wise, they drain local grids and leave the communities to foot the bill… literally. In Alberta, the Pembina Institute estimates that **a single Meta data centre could add $270 to $460 a year to the average household’s electricity bill**, roughly 15 to 25% more, from 2027 to 2031. \[8\] Powering **facilities running 24/7, with life-altering noise** for the people living next to them. \[9\] Their extractive supply chain pushes **fossil fuels like gas and coal back into service and plunders cobalt, lithium and other critical minerals** in Canada and across the world, fueling war, exploitation, genocide, and ecocide. \[10, 11, 12\] AI perpetuates a cycle of violence in which technology is leveraged to fuel forced labour, under unimaginable conditions, to power a virtual *intelligence* that is then used to target populations deemed ‘disposable’. \[13, 14, 15\] This is the Big Tech playbook, backed by the governments that fund, approve and fast-track data centres: **sacrificing life itself for corporate control and profit. All the while claiming the era of AI is inevitable.** It isn't. There is a roadblock, and they know it. Without the rapid deployment of data megacentres, the AI boom cannot be sustained. And **physical infrastructure can be stopped: by communities who refuse it, by Indigenous nations exercising their right to say no, by people who organize and take action.** Together with allies across the climate, legal, and digital rights movements, **we call on Canadian governments to immediately halt approvals for new mega data centres** until robust, legally binding social and environmental criteria are written into national law. These criteria include: - Respecting Indigenous Nations’ jurisdiction to give or withhold consent, through their own laws and on their own terms, and to withdraw it if those terms are broken. - Disclosing the full and cumulative environmental, economic, health and safety impacts of every proposed data centre and respecting strict environmental standards. - Not compromising a just transition away from fossil fuels. - Using 100% renewable energy without disrupting the electricity grid or increasing energy bills for everyday consumers. - Not drawing on critical minerals and water until the needs of people and nature have been met. - Stop building AI on resources, or for uses, that fuel war, genocide, ecocide, exploitative labour, and land theft. **Big Tech and its enablers in government believe they can impose AI, data megacentres and the agenda that comes with them.** But we have every right to ask who benefits and who loses, and to refuse a model that extends an old world of extraction, on someone else's land, at someone else's cost. **We should protect life, not servers. Ecosystems should not be destroyed to serve Big Tech billionaires and their autocratic agenda.** Before the next data centre is proposed in your city, sign the petition for an immediate moratorium. Your signature joins thousands of others calling for a **halt to new data centre approvals until Indigenous Nation’s consent is respected, and public consultation and environmental review are non-negotiable requirements.** \[1\] [AI data centers are booming. Indigenous People want help protecting their lands and knowledge](https://indiginews.com/news/un-emrip-indigenous-artificial-intelligence-data-centres/) \[2\] [First Nation chief says Bell, province bypassing duty to consult on AI data centre, CBC News](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/first-nations-denounce-ai-data-centre-9.7371954) \[3\] [Hamilton-owned corporation signs NDA over proposed AI data centre, Canada’s national Observer](https://www.nationalobserver.com/2026/07/02/news/hamilton-ontario-nda-data-centre) \[4\] [Mark Carney Advisor Says AI Data Centres ‘Provide Markets’ For Gas, DeSmog,](https://www.desmog.com/2026/06/11/mark-carney-advisor-says-ai-data-centres-provide-markets-for-gas/) \[5\] [EnvironmentalCost Of Ai'sEnergy Use: Carbon, Water and Land Footprints, United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health, 2026](https://unu.edu/sites/default/files/2026-10/UNU-INWEH-Report-The_Env_Cost_of_AI-2026.pdf) \[6\] [Clean water bill shows 'troubling shift' from recognizing First Nations rights, says national chief, CBC News, June 17, 2026](https://www.hubspot.com) \[7\] [Canada’s new water bill backtracks on recognizing human right to water for First Nations, The Narwhal, June 16, 2026](https://thenarwhal.ca/canada-first-nations-clean-water-bill-criticism/) \[8\] [New Meta data centre could add up to $460 a year to Albertans’ electricity bills due to government policy, Pembina Institute, August 26, 2026](https://www.pembina.org/media-release/new-meta-data-centre-could-add-460-year-albertans-electricity-bills-due-government) \[9\] [Communities Are Raising Noise Pollution Concerns About Data Centers, Environmental and Energy Study Institute, March 23, 2026](https://www.eesi.org/articles/view/communities-are-raising-noise-pollution-concernsabout-data-centers) \[10\] [Here’s the full leaked document causing a stir in Alberta, The Narwhal, September 17, 2026](https://thenarwhal.ca/alberta-leaked-document-natural-gas-explainer/) \[11\] [What is Genocost? Understanding Congo’s new language of remembrance and justice, The Conversation, August 2, 2026](https://theconversation.com/what-is-genocost-understanding-congos-new-language-of-remembrance-and-justice-286987) \[12\] [Nothing in AI Is Immaterial. The Genocost of the Digital Age in the DR Congo, Social Justice and Ecology Secretariat, August 14, 2026](https://www.sjesjesuits.global/2026/08/14/nothing-in-ai-is-immaterial-the-genocost-of-the-digital-age-in-the-dr-congo/) \[13\] [Inside the US ‘Kill Chain’ That Destroyed an Iranian School, Bloomberg, September 18, 2026](https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2026-iran-school-attack/) \[14\] [‘Lavender’: The AI machine directing Israel’s bombing spree in Gaza, +972, April 3, 2024](https://www.972mag.com/lavender-ai-israeli-army-gaza/) \[15\] [Israel Used AI-Assisted Technology to Destroy Infrastructure in Gaza, Genocide Watch, August 12, 2026](https://www.genocidewatch.com/single-post/israel-used-ai-assisted-technology-to-destroy-infrastructure-in-gaza) [Sign the Petition](https://act.greenpeace.ca/en-ca/protect-life-not-data-centres#sign) ## Humans Against AI **From Sturgeon Lake Cree Nation to Mississauga and Sherbrooke, people are resisting the unchecked spread of data centres.** Indigenous Nations are leading the way in court, and the resistance is growing in the streets and city halls. **And they are winning,** as more and more municipalities press pause. **In Treaty 8 territory, Sturgeon Lake Cree Nation is challenging Alberta's approval of a water licence that would divert six million cubic metres from the Smoky River.** [\[1\]](https://www.aptnnews.ca/national-news/sturgeon-lake-cree-nation-in-alberta-claims-victory-in-first-battle-against-mind-boggling-massive-ai-data-centre/) The Nation ties the licence to Kevin O'Leary's proposed AI data centre park and says the province never consulted them. In August, a judge dismissed the company's bid to shut down the Nation's challenge. The case goes ahead in December **In Mississauga,** residents brought their concerns about energy, noise and a site in a floodplain to council. In September, **council voted unanimously to pause new large data centres for a year, and councillors credited residents with the win.** [\[2\]](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/mississauga-data-centres-coucil-vote-passes-9.7346133)Oakville had done the same a month earlier. **In Sherbrooke, a mega data centre planned on a wooded lot near homes has sparked protest.** [\[3\]](https://www.ledevoir.com/politique/quebec/1013819/sherbrooke-megacentre-donnees-seme-discorde) More than 11,000 people have signed a petition against it, and they're just getting started. In New Brunswick, public pressure pushed the province to tighten the rules on a massive 390-megawatt project. [\[4\]](https://globalnews.ca/news/12064962/new-brunswick-ai-data-centre-open-letter-reject/) Most people across the country oppose these projects and **when people organize, they can outpower corporations.** From the Smoky River to Sherbrooke, people are proving what's possible. Every name brings the next win closer. Add yours. ![energy](https://act.greenpeace.ca/hubfs/energy.png) 6.5M million homes could be powered with the 7.5 gigawatts of energy required to power the proposed O'Leary Wonder Valley data centre park. ![water](https://act.greenpeace.ca/hubfs/water.png) +$460 per year could be added to residents’ energy bill once the Meta's data centre in Sturgeon County commences operations. ![money](https://act.greenpeace.ca/hubfs/money.png) 3 quarters of data centre sites planned in Alberta are in high water stress areas. [Sign the Petition](https://act.greenpeace.ca/en-ca/protect-life-not-data-centres#sign) ## Faq ### Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit? 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