Pushback, promise and everyday life: how artificial intelligence is reshaping Alberta

Is artificial intelligence changing the way humans process and recall information? The research on that question is far from conclusive, but what is certain is that AI has become a pervasive part of everyday life.

The most transformative stretch so far in society’s digital journey has stormed into the lives of everyday Albertans in obvious and tangible ways — and less evident ways as well.

Indeed, to say that AI is everywhere is barely an exaggeration.

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“Artificial Intelligence is not a science-fiction dream anymore and has truly arrived,” is how the Alberta AI Association has explained it.

“At the heart of much of today’s technological innovation, AI is going to change the world more than anything in human history,” declared the association while promoting a day of Edmonton presentations.

Seven years ago.

The conversation today and the reality on the ground suggest that the AI association wasn’t wrong.

Last year was when artificial intelligence “stopped being a future narrative and became present-day infrastructure,” wrote Sydney Armani, the founder and editor of AI World Journal.

“For years AI lived in cycles of hype and skepticism. In 2025 that changed,” the tech entrepreneur from Silicon Valley said in an opinion piece. “Across media, enterprise, science and government, AI became operational, strategic and unavoidable.”

Battle of the backyards

Loudly and controversially, AI has broadcast its presence in the backyards of Alberta’s communities. It’s entered the public discourse via development proposals for data centres and power generators, land-use bylaws, and hearings and consultations.

Alberta Data Centre Watch, an independent public-interest tracking platform, estimates there are 67 operating, under construction, approved or proposed data centres of all types on the books in the province.

The published electrical demand requested from the grid by 20 active Alberta projects — that’s pre-operational — is 13 gigawatts, the platform says. Power plants proposed for on-site generation by specific projects are listed at 8.3 GW.

According to the Alberta Electric System Operator, the queue seeking grid electricity for AI data centres represents more than 20 GW.

For perspective, peak load coming from the grid for all of Alberta — the maximum amount drawn at any given time — is 12 GW.

Numbers like those have made AI the topic of kitchen-table debates in Alberta about a potentially massive upgrade of wires, pipes, buildings and power plants. Top of mind is the potential effect on utility bills, water availability and, because of AI’s appetite for natural gas, the climate writ large that humanity counts on for its very survival.

The debate has also been about where the benefits of data centres accrue, as the provincial government touts serving AI through what it calls “digital refineries.”

Data centres and power stations, under Alberta’s bring-your-own-generation model, will draw on a vast domestic supply of natural gas to earn royalties for the government to pay for services while also fueling the economy. They’ll turn a non-renewable resource into bits and bytes for a worldwide marketplace of knowledge and sped-up processes, goes the thinking.

But it’s been a tough sell.

Polling by Alberta-based Janet Brown Opinion Research last month found that 31 per cent of provincial respondents strongly opposed AI data centres.

Another 36 per cent were either undecided or mostly supportive but with concerns. And 26 per cent mostly opposed AI data centres but believed some should be built.

Commissioned by the CBC, the hybrid phone and online poll gathered opinions from 1,200 Albertans between Sept. 8 and Sept. 21. Its margin of error is plus or minus 2.8 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

Amid public backlash, the Alberta NDP has called for an approvals pause.

“We’ve heard loud and clear from citizens that they need certainty,” the Opposition party says in its AI Data Centres Blueprint. “We are calling for a pause on data centre approvals until a robust impact assessment framework, one Albertans can have confidence in, is in place.”

Daily screen time to reshaped jobs

Yet regardless of where the next data centre lands and beyond the latest poll, townhall or letter to the editor, typical taxpayers have developed routine relationships with AI in their daily lives.

Artificial intelligence is a ubiquitous presence on Albertans’ laptops, phones and tablets as it amps up internet searches, crafts email responses, and overwhelms feeds and algorithms with slop that blurs the distinction between fact and fiction, human and robot.

The face of AI is memes ranging from the poignant to the absurd. Sometimes AI writes supposed news content for Albertans to consume. Other times it narrates the YouTube shows they watch. An AI bot is often the first customer service agent humans connect with for help with their insurance claim or malfunctioning cable box.

It’s also deeply ingrained in organizational processes that customers don’t necessarily notice. These range from the routine, like automating work shifts, to the critical and profound, like hunting down and neutralizing cyber-attacks on critical infrastructure.

As of late 2026, some 88 per cent of organizations globally were using AI in at least one core business function, according to AI Business Weekly. That’s a huge increase from just four years ago, when the percentage was more like 55 per cent, reported the online magazine.

“Artificial intelligence has changed the nature of everything,” Alberta NDP Leader Naheed Nenshi told the Lakeside Leader in June in Slave Lake, “and particularly the nature of jobs and the nature of work.”

In a forecast published in April, Boston Consulting Group estimated that AI will eliminate 10 to 15 per cent of U.S. jobs in the next four or five years.

BCG’s modelling also found that 50 to 55 per cent of all jobs will be fundamentally reshaped by AI in two or three years.

“Task automation doesn’t equal job loss. Most roles will remain — but will change substantially,” says the U.S. report.

The inevitability of more AI underpins at least some of the public support that does exist for data centres.

“Artificial intelligence is not some passing fad. It is here to stay,” said a Saskatchewan Facebook poster, responding to a call for a moratorium on approvals of hyperscale AI data centres by the NDP there.

“I use AI regularly today, and I expect I’ll use it even more in the future,” said the commenter. “Businesses are adopting it. Governments are adopting it. Universities are adopting it.

“The technology train has left the station, and no amount of opposition is going to stop it. The real question isn’t whether AI will exist. The real question is whether Saskatchewan will benefit from it.”

The positive dimensions of AI

Back in Alberta, Technology and Innovation Minister Nate Glubish speaks highly of the potential for AI and what it’s already accomplishing.

An intriguing twist? Glubish says AI holds real promise in addressing climate change and other governmental and societal challenges.

“Alberta sees significant potential for artificial intelligence to reduce emissions and protect the environment, particularly in the energy sector,” Glubish told The Macleod Gazette in an email response to questions related to this article’s focus.

Through Emissions Reduction Alberta, the province awarded $4 million of industry-generated funds in 2020 towards an AI project aimed at detecting, quantifying, tracking and reducing emissions, Glubish noted.

As the product of Calgary-based Qube Technologies is commercialized, predictions are that it will enable carbon dioxide-equivalent emission reductions in Alberta of 6.36 million tonnes by 2030.

That’s like removing 1.4-million gas-powered cars from the road for a year.

Glubish also touted the work of the Alberta Machine Intelligence Institute, or AMII, an Edmonton-based non-profit created by the University of Alberta and the province in 2002.

Through AMII, “we’re building the skills our workforce needs to put AI to work more efficiently,” his statement said.

Backed by the provincial and federal governments, AMII is one of three national institutes under the Pan-Canadian Artificial Intelligence Strategy. Launched in 2017, the federal initiative aspires to establish and maintain Canada as a global leader in AI research, talent retention and commercialization.

Glubish said in his statement that AI is improving wildfire prediction, “giving us better tools to anticipate where fires are likely to start and get resources on the ground faster to protect our communities, infrastructure and landscapes.”

Not mentioned by Glubish — and perhaps less exciting — was the provincial government’s use of AI to help write legislation earlier this year.

The Alberta Whisky Act, which defines and sets standards for the liquor type in the province, had an AI assist in analyzing data and development of its building blocks.

Human oversight and participation were part of the process every step of the way, the government assured Albertans at the time.

Guardrails where?

But in Canada so far, much of the oversight relies on codes of conduct and evolving industry and governmental norms and practices. Overall, Canada has no overarching legislation that puts up enforceable AI guardrails.

In 2025, the bill for what was going to be called the Artificial Intelligence and Data Act died with the prorogation of the first session of the 44th Parliament.

Glubish’s statement said: “As AI plays a larger role in our daily lives, government has a responsibility to establish clear guardrails, real human oversight and safeguards against misuse.

“Our job is to support innovation while maintaining public trust, ensuring Albertans remain at the centre of the decisions that impact their lives.”

The Alberta government plans, for example, to bring forward legislation to better protect Albertans from harms caused by the non-consensual sharing of deepfake intimate images, he said.

George Lee, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, The Macleod Gazette