Companies will soon learn who won the bids to power new data centres in BC, but don’t expect to see a project in the Okanagan on the list.

Despite Kelowna’s growing tech industry, it won’t yet be on the map on the province’s upcoming AI boom. That is for two reasons.

First, BC Hydro’s call for bids excludes FortisBC areas, meaning much of the Okanagan is left out. Second, because that FortisBC service area is already reaching its power capacity.

“Data centres raise a characteristically different and new problem for utilities,” former BC utility commissioner Richard Mason said.

While population growth and individual demand grows at a predictably gradual rate, data centres come on fast and with high power needs, he said. Water used to be a greater concern but new designs don’t require as much.

The private utility is creating its long-term plan for the region and has committed to new infrastructure for Kelowna, but it’s in the market for a big boost in power generation. Meanwhile, cities and builders say growth is outpacing what FortisBC can deliver.

“If somebody says they’re going to build a new smelter or LNG plant, you have years of notice. The problem with data centres is they can be constructed very fast and they use a lot of power,” Mason said. “So, it’s often a timing problem… which is exactly why the government decided to ration the power.”

AI data centres already proposed in other cities like Vancouver and Kamloops present a new problem. They not only draw massive amounts of power but they can be built quickly.

Companies began bidding for electricity to build new data centres across BC earlier this year, with BC Hydro left to review more than a dozen applications, competing for 400 megawatts of total power. Not all are specifically for artificial intelligence, but they total nearly 800 megawatts in requested power.

The final list was expected to be announced in September, but it was postponed due to the provincial election.

Most are likely in the Vancouver area, but Kamloops has also been the site for multiple planned data centres already announced by Telus and Bell. Some have already been approved.

For the Okanagan, limited power capacity has already put the squeeze on some communities, particularly Kelowna where growth in urban areas has delayed some developments up to “several years,” according to a letter the City sent to the BC Utilities Commission earlier this year.

However, FortisBC spokesperson Gary Toft didn’t rule out the utility’s ability to connect a new data centre when speaking with iNFOnews.ca.

“We’re able to meet all of our existing customers’ needs, and certainly we can meet their organic growth, but we’re expanding the system quite rapidly now,” he said.

There are four older data centres in Kelowna already with a combined capacity of around 10 megawatts, far less than a typical AI data centre. Another near Cristina Lake, within the FortisBC grid, is served by a substation with an 85 megawatt capacity, more than 10 per cent of the FortisBC grid.

“Say someone did come with a data centre proposal, it wouldn’t necessarily get quashed by lack of power,” Toft said. “We would look at it the same as we would from any other large commercial customer… So, we consider those requests all the time to see if we’re able to provide power, and provincial legislation encourages us to make sure we’re able to provide power to customers when we can.”

It’s not clear when BC Hydro will announce its approvals for new data centres. The only known proposed project in the Okanagan is Mark Consiglio’s data centre on Kelowna Mountain, but it’s not clear when or if that one will be built.

If shovels hit the ground, it’s planned to be powered on-site, while the province has also restricted BC Hydro from supplying extra power to wholesalers like FortisBC for new data centres.