B.C. premier tells crowd about AI optimism despite energy, safety concerns

Evan Solomon, Minister of Artificial Intelligence and Digital Innovation, leaves a press conference in Vancouver after announcing plans for three large-scale AI data centre project in British Columbia on Monday, May 11, 2026. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Rich Lam

The federal and B.C. governments want artificial intelligence firms to have a strong foothold in Canada to spur economic and job growth, but say there’s also need for guardrails on the technology and return on public investment.

British Columbia Premier David Eby told a crowd at Vancouver’s Web Summit, which has more than 20,000 attendees, that he’s an optimist about the technology having seen both the “opportunity and the threat” it presents.

Eby said B.C. has experienced the extremes of AI, referencing the mass shooting in Tumbler Ridge where he said the shooter’s use of ChatGPT to plan the shooting resulted in the deaths of eight victims.

“We don’t know all the content of the chats or so on, but it was sufficiently concerning that allegedly the OpenAI employees were petitioning to call the police and the company made a decision not to involve law enforcement,” Eby said.

He said the province is now calling “for a minimum threshold for reporting to law enforcement when it comes to using these tools to plan harm to others.”

He said the province has seen the “human fallibility” of the technology, but he remains a “huge optimist” about artificial intelligence.

“We have remarkable and incredible research that’s happened here in the province,” he said. “As a government, we’re embracing the opportunity of AI.”

Eby’s remarks came a day after Telus and federal AI Minister Evan Solomon announced a cluster of three AI data centres in B.C.

The premier said BC Hydro as a public utility gives the province a “huge advantage” because of its low energy costs and clean output.

The demand for power from the industry could be overwhelming in B.C. because of its low rates, but there’s a need to work with the federal government on sovereign AI capacity, which is of national importance, Eby said.

There are companies shopping around for support from governments, and Eby said federal and provincial funding “helps them to be able to expand and keeps them located here in British Columbia.”

“We have companies here that get calls,” he said. “They’re like, ‘We got a call from Alabama and they’re offering us $100 million to move our facility down there and all these tax credits and whatever else. And what do you guys have?’”

Telus said the two data centres that are planned for Vancouver and one in Kamloops will draw 150 megawatts of power by 2032.

That is equivalent to about 12 to 14 per cent of the output of the newly built Site C dam in northeast B.C.

Solomon said at a news conference at the summit on Tuesday that government support for companies is to help entrepreneurs and keep them in Canada, and data centres are the “backbone.”

“Let’s not demonize these folks. These are people who have advanced educations. They’ve decided to start a company. They’re solving problems like medical breakthroughs,” he said. “We don’t want to be investing public money for people in other countries and billionaires.”

In January, the B.C. government launched a competitive process for companies seeking to establish certain power-hungry tech projects, with 300 megawatts set aside for AI and 100 megawatts for data centres every two years.

B.C. Jobs Minister Ravi Kahlon spoke during a panel discussion at the convention on Tuesday, and said public investments in data centres and AI firms are important because they’ll see a return, rather than just handing out grants.

“There was a time when all we did was write grants to companies and that’s OK because sometimes that’s needed,” he said. “We wouldn’t be making investments in these organizations unless we thought there was a real benefit for the public.”

This report by Darryl Greer, The Canadian Press, was first published May 12, 2026