Oakville enacts data centre pause as Ontario municipalities wrestle with AI buildout

Oakville enacted a one-year moratorium on new data centres, becoming the first Ontario municipality to take the step as local lawmakers grapple with the concerns surrounding the new wave of facilities powering artificial intelligence. Councillors also directed staff to study whether the town’s own regulations need to be updated to address potential noise, vibration and emissions issues from data centres, as well as broader land-use considerations. “We’re operating here not out of fear, and not in reaction to any one application,” said Mayor Rob Burton ahead of the unanimous vote in support of the moratorium at a special town council meeting Tuesday.

“That’s our job: to be alert, and to take the measures necessary.” Oakville’s moratorium comes as neighbouring Mississauga is set to vote next month on its own data centre freeze and other Ontario municipalities study what guardrails they can put around new developments. Related: Mississauga puts 1-year pause on data centre development Hamilton city council rejects one-year pause on AI data centres Regional Councillor calls for report on potential impacts of AI data centres While Oakville officials said the town had no formal data centre applications, developer Hive Digital Technologies in May announced plans for a 320-megawatt AI facility in the Greater Toronto Area. Land records indicated a Hive subsidiary purchased property in Oakville days before it made the announcement.

The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Canadian Press. The councillor who represents the area where that property is located backed Oakville’s moratorium plan. Tom Adams called the town’s data centre study, “not only appropriate but responsible.” “Oakville deserves a clear, evidence-based understanding of how data centres interact with our electricity, our water, our wastewater and our telecommunications infrastructure, our environmental goals, our employment lands, the character of our neighbourhood, and, most importantly, the health of our residents,” Adams told a council meeting this week.

Competition among large tech companies such as OpenAI, Anthropic, Microsoft and Google has fuelled a surge in demand for data centres, energy-hungry warehouses packed with powerful computer chips used to train and operate increasingly complex AI models. Canada only has a handful of large hyperscale data centres,… Oakville has enacted a one-year moratorium on new data centres, becoming the first Ontario municipality to take the step as local lawmakers grapple with the concerns surrounding the new wave of facilities powering artificial intelligence.