Building permit issued for Yates Avenue data centre

$1-million storage and shop space will be built at 162 Yates Ave.

Construction is getting underway on a Yates Avenue industrial lot bought by Protexxa and Missanabie Cree Business LP to build a five-megawatt cybersecurity and data centre.

The City of Sault Ste. Marie granted a building permit last month for a $1-million storage and shop space at 162 Yates Ave.

First reported by SooToday last December, the development was estimated to provide a minimum of 200 new jobs, up to 1,000 jobs when fully operational.

However, opposition to the data centre drew protestors to the Ronald A. Irwin Civic Centre on Aug. 10.

Less than one week later, news broke of a much larger data centre proposed on land held by Algoma Steel.

At its most recent meeting, city council voted to slap an interim moratorium on big data centres, but their decision didn’t change their earlier approval of the smaller Yates Avenue project.