This story is part of our ongoing investigative series, Hidden Wonder Valley.

A Court of King’s Bench judge in Alberta has dismissed celebrity investor Kevin O’Leary’s attempt to block Sturgeon Lake Cree Nation (SLCN) from requesting a judicial review of water permits for the C$70-billion Wonder Valley artificial intelligence (AI) data centre project.

Justice P. K. Johal ruled Aug. 13 that the hearing should proceed with the question of whether the First Nation had been consulted prior to Alberta Environment and Protected Areas granting a licence to withdraw six million cubic metres of water from the Smoky River. 

O’Leary had argued the case should not be allowed to go ahead because the company was not included in the court filing. 

The court decision [pdf] can be read in full in a document shared with The Energy Mix.

SLCN Chief Sheldon Sunshine said in a statement on Facebook that “today’s decision means O’Leary’s group lost on every ground,” and that SLCN’s judicial review will go ahead in December.

‘A Mind-Boggling, Massive Project’

“O’Leary’s data centre here in Alberta is a mind-boggling, massive project, which the province has been shepherding through their regulatory system using the municipality to evade their duties to us.”

“There is no environmental assessment and next to no consultation with our Nations,” he added. “Now, all Albertans are seeing what we have been living for 20 months—the province will push these hyperscale massive data centres in our backyards, despite serious concerns.”

Johal also concluded that O’Leary Digital Limited (ODL), which has gone by several different names since 2024, including as a numbered Alberta company, may not take part as either an intervenor or respondent in the judicial review. 

Paul Palandjian, CEO of O’Leary Digital told The Mix the company “is disappointed with the decision and strongly disagrees with the continuation of this proceeding.”

“We have not yet had an opportunity to review the decision in detail and will reserve further comment until that review is complete.”

The water licence was granted to the Municipal District of Greenview, not O’Leary, and the judge found that a lack of transparency around the land purchase and sale agreement worked against the company’s claim. 

“(O’Leary)’s connection to the water licence is both contingent and speculative, which cannot support a finding that they are directly affected by SLCN’s judicial review application,” wrote Johal. “Unfortunately, ODL submitted a version of the (purchase and sale agreement) that is heavily redacted, which makes it impossible to determine whether those contractual rights have crystallized.”

O’Leary Refuses to Share

Only five pages of the 59-page agreement are legible, according to the court, and court records show Palandjian refused to provide the entire, unredacted agreement.

“Greenview, not (O’Leary), owns the (Greenview Industrial Gateway) lands in question,” Justice Johal wrote, adding that the company redacted so much of the detail that it could not be determined when or how the water licence, which is attached to the land, will be transferred.

Canada’s National Observer previously obtained the affidavit filed by Palandjian in the case, which included the purchase agreement as an attachment. The document revealed that the municipality signed [pdf] a purchase agreement with O’Leary on March 25, 2025, with Greenview agreeing to act as an agent for the company in obtaining the necessary water permits for up to 24 million cubic metres of water annually. 

The permit was then to be held in trust by Greenview, with O’Leary making the water permits a condition of completing the first phase of the land sale.  

“It’s a huge advantage to O’Leary,” University of Calgary Emeritus Professor of Law Nigel Bankes told the Observer. “Normally, it would be a project proponent who’d be doing all of this and paying for all of this. And here you’ve got the municipality— a government—doing this.”

Greenview has spent about $70 million to lay the groundwork for industrial development. The plan for the world’s largest AI data centre requiring up to nine gigawatts, powered by North America’s largest gas-fired plant, is just the latest project they’ve been promoting.

Greenview told The Mix it is reviewing the decision with its legal counsel. 

“The judicial review remains before the Court of King’s Bench, and so Greenview will not provide a comment on the litigation or on the terms of the purchase and sale agreement,” wrote CAO Stacey Wabick.

Wabick added that SLCN names both Greenview and the province, specifically the Minister of Indigenous Relations and the Minister of Environment and Protected Areas, in the court case. “The determination that consultation was not required was made by the provincial Aboriginal Consultation Office, and the duty to consult rests with the Crown, not with Greenview,” he said.

“Greenview understands there are multiple stakeholders on a potential project such as this,” Wabick wrote, adding that the municipality is “committed to fulfilling the municipality’s legal obligations to work with stakeholders, including Indigenous groups, on all projects—including this one.”

Repeated Requests for Disclosure

However, the MD of Greenview joined with O’Leary in opposing Sturgeon’s request for a judicial review, arguing that “it is irrelevant whether a final decision has been made to go ahead with the project,” What should be considered, the community stated, is “what rights O’Leary has and whether those rights will be impacted by SLCN’s judicial review.”

Johal noted that Sturgeon had repeatedly requested disclosure of the terms of the agreement, with the First Nation arguing that the lack of details made it “impossible to determine O’Leary’s rights to the water licence.”

Palandjian testified he had told Sturgeon Lake Cree Nation Chief Sheldon Sunshine in January, 2025 that Greenview had already applied for the water licence and agreed to transfer it. However, the water permit application was not submitted until a month later, and the purchase agreement was not signed until two months later.

More than a year later, in an April 2026 appeal of the water permits before the provincial Environmental Appeals Board, Palandjian denied during questioning that a final decision to proceed with Wonder Valley had yet been made.

“Without cooperation from Mr. Palandjian or some other O’Leary representative, there was no information available to SLCN that would have permitted them to discover and serve ODL in its numbered form,” Johal wrote in the decision.

“From the outset of the Wonder Valley project, ODL has worked in good faith to engage and consult with Sturgeon Lake Cree Nation and other Indigenous and local communities,” Palandjian said. “We remain committed to meaningful consultation, responsible project development and regulatory oversight, while working to support positive long-term outcomes for the communities in and around the project.”

But he said the company will “continue to defend our position through the appropriate legal process while remaining committed to constructive engagement and consultation with SLCN and other communities and stakeholders.”

In a list of action items provided [pdf] at Greenview’s July 21 Committee of the Whole Meeting, an item still listed as “in progress” called for Council to “authorize Administration to purchase 1,650 acres of Crown lands within the Greenview Industrial Area Structure Plan at the appraised value for the purpose of selling to 2664755 Alberta Ltd. as per the purchase sale agreement ‘Wonder Valley.’” It was first added to the municipality’s to-do list in March, 2025.

“The purchase agreement with the Province is finalized and ready to sign once we got [sic] the go ahead from the O’Leary group that they are ready to move forward,” according to comments on the document.

A judge in a similar case ruled Aug. 12 that the Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation cannot proceed with its request for a judicial review of a coal and tar sands mine reclamation program because the companies weren’t properly notified.

No Public Engagement

Despite an invitation, neither Palandjian or anyone from O’Leary Digital were in Sturgeon Lake for an Aug. 11 open house to answer band members’ questions, reports CBC News. 

Palandjian said that the company opted not to attend due to “increasingly adversarial correspondence and conduct directed at our personnel during an organized site visit.” 

The company has not yet held an open house or any engagement sessions in the community, located about 180 kilometres south of Grande Prairie.

O’Leary has held one open house in Grande Prairie, and is facing opposition to both the project in Alberta and a nearly identical AI data centre he has planned near the Great Salt Lake in Utah.

SLCN Chief Sunshine has called on the federal government to conduct an environmental impact assessment of Wonder Valley after a preliminary report by a physicist and complex systems scientist found the project at full buildout would be “one of the largest single-site heat sources on the planet.”

The Impact Assessment Agency of Canada told The Mix it was waiting on more information about the project. Alberta exempted [pdf] Wonder Valley from an environmental impact assessment in March.