Bell’s $1.7-billion Saskatchewan AI data centre frames three halls as 2027 opening nears

Construction is scaling up at Bell Canada’s $1.7-billion AI data centre southeast of Regina, where framing is complete on three of four planned halls and crews are preparing the first buildings for service in the first half of 2027. Saskatchewan Crown Investments Minister Jeremy Harrison and Bell officials briefed reporters at the 65-hectare Sherwood site as heavy equipment moved among trailers, steel pipe and unfinished walls, The Canadian Press reported.

Harrison said about 500 workers are on site at any given time. John Watson, a Bell group president overseeing business markets, AI Fabric and related units, said the first two of the four 300-megawatt-campus halls are set to begin operating in the first half of next year. Anchor tenants named for the facility are U.S. AI cloud provider CoreWeave and chipmaker Cerebras.

Bell is also talking about a far larger second phase: expanding capacity from 300 megawatts to 1.2 gigawatts at a cost Bell puts near $50 billion, which would require a dedicated natural gas plant nearby. Watson said there is no timeline for that expansion and described the follow-on build as “probably twice as large as this one,” according to The Canadian Press and AI Affairs.

Harrison said a completed expansion could support 500 permanent jobs on site plus up to 3,000 off-site and community roles, and that Bell would move its AI Fabric headquarters to Regina, adding about 100 management jobs. Regina Mayor Chad Bachynski said the project could help retain young talent and attract workers. Bell has also discussed research partnerships with the University of Regina, including the possibility of capturing waste heat for greenhouses.

The project has drawn protests over environmental and grid impacts and what critics call insufficient public consultation before approval. Saskatchewan’s Opposition NDP has called for a moratorium on large-scale data centres. Energy critic Sally Housser urged town-hall meetings in affected areas, saying residents worry about power bills and neighbourhood impacts. Harrison argued elected officials already speak for constituents and that support is broad.

Watson has said the centre will use a closed-loop cooling system that does not draw groundwater and that Bell does not expect the facility to raise power rates. Separately, Bell and Cisco signed a Sept. 29 memorandum of understanding to explore sovereign AI infrastructure that would pair Bell’s Canadian data-centre capacity and network with Cisco AI, security and management technology for government and regulated customers, AI Affairs reported.

That Cisco collaboration sits alongside Bell’s production deployment of a Cohere-built cybersecurity model on Bell AI Fabric announced in September. Together, the Regina build, the Cisco MOU and the Cohere deployment mark an aggressive push by Canada’s largest telecom to own more of the country’s AI compute stack — even as provincial politics over data-centre siting and electricity demand intensifies.

Sources: The Canadian Press via ConstructConnect (Oct. 6, 2026); AI Affairs (Oct. 4, 2026); AI Affairs on Bell–Cisco MOU (Oct. 2, 2026); Bell / Cohere via NewsWire (Sept. 23, 2026).