Most of Canada’s big telecommunications companies aren’t offering high-speed internet to rural areas of Alberta, leaving municipalities and smaller local companies to do it themselves.
Money from the $780 million federal and provincial broadband funds is helping move projects forward. But some say the rollout is still too slow for rural areas to gain access to the services and work opportunities broadband can offer.
“I think there’s a need to actually spend faster, spend harder, and get the job done sooner,” said Paul McLauchlin, reeve of Ponoka County and president of the Rural Municipalities of Alberta, which represents Alberta counties and municipal districts.
McLauchlin is advocating for a co-ordinated effort to build these projects within a year. He said rural broadband gives communities a chance at attracting economic investment, provides educational opportunities and solves some health-care issues caused by staff shortages in local hospitals.
The federal government announced its Universal Broadband Fund in 2020 with the aim of connecting all Canadians to high-speed internet by 2030. The provincial government announced its program in 2022 which would provide matching funds to projects submitted to the federal one.
The projects must give residents of an area access to broadband with the CRTC bench mark of 50/10, 50 megabits per second for downloads and 10 megabits a second for uploads. The projects can be fibre to the home, fixed wireless access or low Earth orbit satellite (LEOS) services such as Starlink.
McLauchlin argues government needs to step up the pace so communities can start seeing benefits as soon as possible.
“The program has a schedule. What would it take to cut that schedule in half or to a third? What would it take to do that strategically and to deploy not over a five or 10-year window that actually to deploy in a year?” he asked. “Is that possible? It is possible.
“Why would you drag this out because it is so foundational and enabling to investment in rural Alberta and all Canadians across the board?”
‘We have to invest in this’
Clearwater County started working on its broadband strategy eight years ago.
The county located on the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains west of Red Deer had its first project approved in 2022 to bring broadband to the hamlet of Nordegg.
In June 2024, the county was granted $62.7 million for another five projects, allowing it to move ahead on its efforts to connect nearly 2,000 homes with broadband internet.
Clearwater County is still picking up 25 per cent of the cost of the expansion. The fibre optic lines will be built by a company contracted by the county. Two local internet service providers will get the service into these homes.
Clearwater County Reeve Michelle Swanson said high-speed internet will give residents access to more health-care and educational opportunities delivered online.
She said better internet will allow younger residents to work in jobs of the future without having to leave the county.
“We know that in the future if we’re going to give the younger generation any kind of hope … we have to invest in this,” she said.
Rural and Indigenous communities in Alberta have had to initiate their own broadband expansion with and without government help.
Sturgeon County north of Edmonton has built out its broadband in partnership with a private company without any government funding. The county didn’t qualify for the Universal Broadband Fund because some residents had access to high-speed internet.
Out of Canada’s large telecommunications firms, only Telus has received grants from the UBF to expand rural broadband in Alberta.
Swanson is frustrated that rural municipalities and smaller regional firms are having to do the work themselves to connect their residents to high-speed internet. She believes the big telecom companies won’t expand into rural areas unless they get some kind of “carrot” from the CRTC or the federal government.
“We, as rural, are suffering because of that,” she said.
Mixed results
Michael McNally, associate professor in the faculty of education at the University of Alberta, said the results from the rural broadband expansion have been a mixed bag.
McNally said projects funding starting in 2022 had already been submitted leaving newer projects out in the cold. Alberta has hived out $36 million for newer projects but McNally said it isn’t enough.
McNally also questions the 50/10 benchmark set by the CRTC.
While those speeds are a considerable improvement for homes in many rural areas, McNally said they aren’t sufficient for medium and large businesses or public facilities like hospitals and schools.
“If we cover communities with saying ‘we just need to get to 50/10’, we might not actually be laying the the infrastructure, putting in the infrastructure that’s going to make the non-household elements of that community retainable or attractable,” he said.
The Universal Broadband Fund is going to 62 projects in Alberta which will bring high-speed internet to 51,000 more homes in 328 rural and Indigenous communities.