⚡ Backlash

Together with

Good morning! 🖥️ Congrats to GLM-5.1, the preferred AI model among construction professionals, according to research by LinkedIn. It is easy to see why. Unlike standard quick chatbots, GLM-5.1 is built to run autonomously for hours on a single prompt, meaning massive project documents can be meticulously crunched and organized.

⏰ Today’s read: 5 ½ minutes

MARKETS

Economy: Canada’s construction sector saw a distinct divide in March as a steady slowdown in residential homebuilding dragged down overall investment. According to Statistics Canada, total building investment dipped 1.3% to $22.6 billion, which represents a 6.4% decline compared to the same time last year. This pullback was entirely driven by the housing sector, where spending on both single-family homes and multi-unit buildings fell, marking the third consecutive

EVENTS

Get some real estate re-education at SiteSummit

The market has shifted. Have you?

Learn what strategies industry leaders are using to navigate the changing real estate development landscape at SiteSummit’s Housing 201 session in Toronto next month.

More than 600 of the construction industry’s brightest are headed to George Brown's Waterfront Campus on June 23-24 for two days of Summer School. It’s just one of the many sessions that will have you educated and equipped to compete in today’s construction landscape. See you there!

NEED TO KNOW

The week's headlines

♥️ Heartland project: Pembina has greenlit the construction of its $570-million Heartland Extraction Plant in Alberta, an expanded version of a previously proposed facility designed to process up to 750 million cubic feet of natural gas liquids per day. 

🚧 Held up: The construction of a massive, multi-million-dollar transit hub at King and Victoria streets in downtown Kitchener has been delayed following an Ontario Superior Court ruling that prevents the Region of Waterloo from clearing a local homeless encampment.

⚡ Power play: The Ontario government is fast-tracking the construction of a new 500-kilovolt transmission line running from Barrie to Sudbury to meet the rapidly rising electricity demands of northern Ontario’s expanding mining, housing, and industrial sectors.

🚃 Terminal connection: Keyera Corp., AltaGas Ltd., and Canadian National Railway Co. (CN) have finalized a partnership to construct the $240-million Alberta Corridor Export Rail Terminal, designed to bridge the Alberta Industrial Heartland with West Coast export networks.

THE BIG STORY

Crunching data centre backlash

While data centre work presents a massive opportunity for the construction sector, not everyone is excited. Opposition is already forming and the industry needs to stay aware. 

Does not compute: This month, hundreds of protesters marched through downtown Vancouver to demonstrate against two newly proposed urban Telus data centers. Opposition centers on the massive, localized footprint in urban centres and resource demands required to run these facilities 24/7. 

Debugging water usage: Contractors are deploying heavily engineered design solutions to save precious water used for cooling. Mechanical teams are shifting away from traditional evaporative cooling vents, opting instead for advanced closed-loop liquid-to-chip architectures or even using recycled rainwater.

Feel the heat: Instead of wasting thermal output and causing heat pollution, some data centres are being designed to harness the heat. In Vancouver, builds are being engineered to feed their massive heat energy directly into the Mount Pleasant Neighbourhood Energy Utility and Creative Energy's downtown network, reclaiming the computer heat to provide carbon-free warmth for up to 150,000 homes. 

Race to the top: B.C.’s approach has been to make data centre developers earn it. The province has a strict 400 MW limit on new emerging technology connections over the next two years, forcing data center developers to bid competitively and prove their net economic and community value before receiving power allocations. 

The rural alternative: To sidestep some of these criticisms, developers are increasingly shifting massive hyperscale projects to the Prairies. In Alberta, megaprojects like the proposed 7.5-gigawatt Wonder Valley facility in Greenview and Synapse Data Centers' campus in Olds are taking this path. But the trade off is small towns sometimes don’t have the required infrastructure and must be upgraded.

TOGETHER WITH PROCORE

The AI gap in Canadian construction is bigger than you think

Our national survey of Canadian construction leaders revealed an industry at an early crossroads with AI: curious, cautious, and constrained by some (very solvable) problems. 

On June 9th, join SiteNews for a free live discussion on where adoption is actually taking hold, where it's stalling, and what it means for the industry. 

Featuring insights from Ediphi CEO Dustin DeVan, Chandos Construction VDC Director Vincent Plourd, and Procore Field COO Mike Ernst. Moderated by SiteNews Editor Russell Hixson. 

Presented in partnership with Procore.

PROJECT SPOTLIGHT

Science project

Ontario has broken ground on the new $1.04-billion, 400,000-square-foot Ontario Science Centre on Toronto's waterfront. The project was awarded to the Ontario Science Partners consortium, with Sacyr Canada Inc. and Amico Design Build Inc. serving as general contractors. Designed by Hariri Pontarini Architects and Snøhetta, the campus layout draws inspiration from celestial patterns, featuring a mainland building of scalloped, modular volumes that frame views of the lake and skyline.

PROJECT UPDATES

Protesters are angry at Burnaby Hospital project cancellation 

BC Hydro launches Mount Pleasant Substation upgrade

Crews working on new airport tower in Edmonton

Fredericton performing arts centre projected to open in 2027

Colas subsidiary wins $554M Bradford Bypass contract

WHAT WE’RE TALKING ABOUT

✍️ LISTEN: Site C Dam renamed after late B.C. premier 

🏗️ PHOTOS: Massive gantry cranes arrive in Halifax 

🏃 READ: Are Canadian builders falling behind on AI?

👂 LISTEN: Langford cracking down on construction noise

🚔 READ: $3M lost in alleged construction fraud

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Here’s to a great rest of the week!

Disclaimer: SiteNews is an independently-operated news website. Views expressed are that of the editorial team and are based on publicly available information unless otherwise noted through sponsored content.