Anthropic Signs 20-Year Lease at EverWind’s Point Tupper Data Centre in Nova Scotia
Anthropic has signed its first Canadian data-centre deal, agreeing to lease the first phase of a planned AI campus at Point Tupper, just outside Port Hawkesbury on Cape Breton Island, CBC News reported on October 16. EverWind Fuels will build and own the facility, while the Claude developer takes the opening phase for a term of at least 20 years. Anthropic said the site will power Claude models and serve rising demand from Canadian and global customers.
EverWind, led by chief executive Trent Vichie, plans two stages: 95 megawatts online by the end of 2027 and a further 325 megawatts in 2028, for 420 megawatts in total. For scale, Nova Scotia’s entire generating capacity sits close to 3,000 megawatts. The company says it is raising $8 billion in private capital for the campus and another $2 billion for four onshore wind farms, roughly $10 billion in all. Land clearing has started, and officials hope to pour foundations before winter.
The provincial grid will carry the load at first, with EverWind’s wind farms supplying power later. EverWind and Anthropic say they will pay for any required grid upgrades, and the Independent Energy System Operator told CBC it studies every connection request before approving it. Cooling will rely on a closed-loop water-glycol system drawing on a nearby lake, at about 100,000 litres a day for the first phase and 500,000 litres once both phases run.
What it means in practice
Both companies have signed on to Ottawa’s responsible data centre development principles, the non-binding guidelines released last month, which makes Point Tupper an early test of whether promises on power rates, water and local benefit hold up. The project joins a wider compute race that includes Bell AI Fabric’s 1.2 GW Saskatchewan hub and sovereign-infrastructure deals such as the Bell–Cisco memorandum of understanding.
Local support was loud: Premier Tim Houston praised the investment, and Richmond County Warden Lois Landry said residents were warming to the plan after weeks of speculation. A consortium of Mi’kmaw communities, fronted by Membertou First Nation, is negotiating a nine per cent equity stake, and EverWind promises a community benefit program worth tens of millions of dollars. The Ecology Action Centre is reserving judgment, saying impacts on ratepayers and the environment still need to be quantified.
What to watch: whether the grid operator confirms capacity for the second phase, how the community fund is governed, and whether Anthropic’s Canadian customers, including public bodies, are offered in-country processing once the halls come online.