Failing already

The proponent has failed to adequetly notify potentially impacted communities and request invite for comment and participation, both of which deadlines have now passed. Many in the local community were not even aware of this project until recently through social media. Adequete consultaiton can NOT be conducted if the proponent is not making it aware to the potentially impacted communities they can participate in the impact assessment as well as how to do so. IAAC will be incapable of making any reasonable assessment, if communities are not properly involved. The Key issues document highlights Accidents and Malfunctions as well as Indigenous Concsultation and Engagement only. There is no mention of key issues related to non-indigenous community Consultaiton and Enagagement, reflective of the proponents failture to involve potetially impacted communities. Reflected in this is the absence of the below significant and anticipated impacts:

• There are significant concerns regarding energy usage with impacts both to grid demand as well as potential socio-economic impacts through increases in demand from the project resulting in increased rates for local community energy users.
• There are significant concerns on the cooling demands of the project and its demand on the local water supply, especially in the context of being located in a farming communnity which has experienced drought conditions in recent years. How will demand be met? In times of drought, how will priority be determined? Will farmers get priority over this project?
• There are significant concerns regarding pollution to the local air and water, and thus community health, through excessive power generation (if additional, local power generation is used to meet the projects demands) and waste and contamination. This is especially concerning in a region which grows food and has ecologcially sensitive areas in the vicinity.
• There are significant concerns of impacts to public health due to infrasonic noise pollution from the project which has been shown to impact human health (Du et al. 2010; Waye et al. 2002).
• There is significant concern that outside of the construction phase, there is little to no benefit to the community through revenue or jobs. A significant concern when weighed against the numerous anticipated impacts including potential impacts to socio-ecnomic position through potential to increased prices on energy and impacts to other jobs such as farming. It must also be recognized that public perception plays a role into these impacts with consumers potentially chosing to avoid farms in the vicinity of data centers. This is in stark antagonism to the eco-tourism sector of Sturgeon County.

The lack of community enagagement in this assessment renders any conclusion insufficient and the impacted communities of Sturgeon County, St. Albert, Fort Saskatchewan, Sherwood Park, and others must be adequetly included in the assessment process to produce any meaningful or accurate assessment of the impact from this project.