Bell Canada: Bell Canada Kamloops

Bell Canada’s Kamloops AI data centre is the flagship facility in its new Bell AI Fabric initiative. Located in Kamloops, British Columbia, the first phase of this facility will be operational in June 2025. It is purpose-built for AI inference workloads, in partnership with chip provider Groq, and is part of a larger six-site supercluster in B.C. aiming for about 500 MW of hydro-powered AI compute capacity.The location was chosen for its clean power supply, favorable climate (warm, dry, low dew point), and strong connectivity infrastructure, including proximity to major fibre routes and institutional partnerships (notably Thompson Rivers University). 

⚙️ Facility Highlights

• Initial Power Capacity: ~ 7 megawatts (MW) for the first AI inference facility in Kamloops.
• Future Expansion: Additional 26 MW facilities planned at TRU (Thompson Rivers University) for coming years, and further high-density sites in later phases. 
• Energy Supply & Sustainability: Entire project powered by clean hydroelectric power. Waste heat from the centre will be reused—e.g., contributing heating to TRU’s buildings via its district energy system. 
• Climate & Site Conditions: Warm, dry climate with low dew point, good environmental stability; built on large tectonic plates (lower seismic risk) and favorable humidity conditions.
• Design Flexibility & Density: Infrastructure is designed to be “future-proof” with flexibility for different rack densities (30-kW to 130-kW racks or more) and fluid cooling support.

🔐 Security & Compliance

• Specific details about certifications (e.g. ISO, SOC, PCI) were not confirmed in publicly available sources as of this date.
• Physical and digital security details have not been disclosed in public reports.
• Bell emphasizes data sovereignty, implying compliance with Canadian regulatory expectations around data residency, privacy, and security in AI compute operations. 

🌐 Connectivity & Carrier Access

• Institutional Partnership: There is a strong collaboration with Thompson Rivers University (TRU), which enhances local academic access and network integration. 
• Network Backbone & Fibre: The facility leverages Bell’s existing fibre network infrastructure; Kamloops is on national fibre backbones and benefits from fibre-dense connectivity. 
• Low Latency for Local Users: Because the inference facility is local, many data queries will not need to leave the Kamloops region, improving response times for local or regional users.

💼 Who It Serves

• AI / Machine Learning Workloads: Particularly inference operations for large language models and similar AI applications. 
• Research & Academia: Students and faculty at TRU will have access for training, research, and experiential learning. 
• Canadian Enterprises & Public Institutions: Organizations seeking sovereign AI compute capacity, local data residency, and clean power basis. 
• Sustainability-oriented Users: Customers that prioritize green energy, waste-heat reuse and low environmental impact in their infrastructure.