The race to build data centres at a breakneck pace could lead to a future full of giant airplane hangars as the industry lays a big wager on artificial intelligence and the ability to power new facilities, according to panelists at a recent conference in Montreal.
The speculative data centre development boom has become so intense. And Ariana Batori, a principal at New York-based alternative investment firm Stonepeak, told industry professionals what could happen if it all fails to click.
"I’ve heard of developers planning these sites who are essentially saying, 'If the AI demand isn't there, we'll just rent it out as a plane hangar,'" Batori said at the Connect North American Investment in Digital Infrastructure & AI 2026 conference last week.
The explosive growth of AI and machine learning is fueling demand for data centres across the United States and Canada. In Olds, Alberta, Synapse Data Center said it plans to build what would be Canada's first one-gigawatt data centre, roughly 10 times larger than any existing data centre in the country. The facility "will be the sole consumer of the power generated on-site," Synapse said.
The possibility, no matter how far-fetched, of having to use buildings meant to house data centres as airplane hangars is a direct result of a collision between lightning-fast AI investment capital and a power grid that moves at a glacial pace, the panelists said. Philippe Dunsky, president of Dunsky Energy + Climate Advisors, said the impact of the blitz to build data centres could be huge.
"General electrification [including a movement toward electric vehicles] is already projected to double electricity demand in Canada by 2050, a reality that requires the reconstruction of the entire existing power system in just two and a half decades," Dunsky said from the stage.
A "timing and scale mismatch"
The country, he said, must build as much electricity capacity in the next 25 years as it took the previous 100 years to create, describing it as a "timing and scale mismatch" between fast-moving investors and the "slow-moving beast" of the power sector.
The focus of data centre operators on securing an adequate supply of electricity has become so strong that having the money alone is no longer enough to guarantee success.
"Money is easy, execution is hard," Batori observed, noting that Stonepeak now prioritizes "execution teams" who can actually navigate the finite resources of time, people and power.
This energy bottleneck is forcing a rethink of how these projects are funded, according to Stuart Murray, a managing director at investment giant BlackRock. With the value of global infrastructure needs hitting $7 trillion, traditional banks are experiencing "indigestion" and hitting their lending limits, he said.
The reality on the ground is becoming a contest of who can plug in first, regardless of the long-term strategy. Benjamin Desmarais, a partner at Novacap, pointed out that even in historically tech-friendly regions, the power grid is the ultimate gatekeeper. He said the industry is currently grappling with a regulatory climate and power constraints that have deprioritized data center growth in favor of other industrial needs.
This sentiment was echoed by Billy Krassakopoulos, CEO of data centre operator Enovum Data Centers, who highlighted the extreme measures developers are taking to find available power.
"Wherever energy is available, short-term energy is available to fulfill client demand," Krassakopoulos observed, adding that his own firm has begun a gas-fueled project in North Carolina due to the significant power acquisition headwinds currently facing Quebec.
Dunsky warned that the challenge to build more electrical infrastructure is undermined by unfavorable math. The cost of building new electrical supply does not add up for the government-associated utility monopolies that will largely be tasked with the job, he said.
"The marginal cost of building new power is now often higher than the average rate charged to customers, which creates a situation where utilities view rapid growth as a financial risk to their existing ratepayers," Dunsky said.