Saguenay is located about 460km (286 miles) north of Montreal, Quebec. It was formed by the merger of smaller communities in 2002. One of those smaller communities, Chicoutimi, was founded by the French in 1676. As is true of most of the province, the predominant language is French.
Saguenay is a big city in terms of area, with a relatively low population. Its residents number over 140,000, who are spread across 494 square miles! Along with the broad population distribution, the region in and around Saguenay is heavily agricultural, both in terms of crops and cattle.
Saguenay has so much available fresh water, residents and businesses don’t typically pay a separate monthly water bill. Their water utility is part of their property tax. The city is touched by Lake St-John, the Saguenay River, Lac Kenogami, and tributaries. The Laurentian Range, montains situated between Saguenay and Quebec City, generate runoff that flows almost entirely northward to the Saguenay area. Water shortages there are virtually nonexistent, even during dry years. Hydroelectricity is abundant, renewable, and easily accessible through Hydro Quebec
Due to the massive physical area of the city, there’s ample space for development, including space on major highways. While zoning laws are strict, we can obtain commercial land that directly abuts agricultural land. We could build a structure that straddles the two and still meet zoning requirements.
The Saguenay area boasts two strong fiber-network Internet connection options, in part due to its robust tech industries. Due to the presence of a number of large and small tech firms, including The CGI Group, Saguenay boasts a large pool of IT talent.
Saguenay city authorities have expressed a strong interest and openness to the Greenhouse Servers project. We have been working in close connection with city officials since the project’s inception.
At 48º North lattitude, Saguenay is cold, averaging more than thirty days a year where the thermometer dips to -30ºC (-22ºF) or below, with most winter days significantly below the freezing mark. Those prolonged cold temperatures make it the ideal location for our heat-exchange system, where we siphon the heat from servers off and redirect it to greenhouses.