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Part of Grants and funding

Alberta Broadband Fund

A made-in-Alberta solution to help ensure every household in Alberta can access high-speed internet.

The joint Expression of Interest under the Alberta Broadband Fund to bring high-speed internet to areas that still lack access is now closed.

Overview

As part of the Alberta Broadband Strategy, we have committed $36 million to the Alberta Broadband Fund (ABF) to help ensure every rural, remote, and Indigenous household in the province can access high-speed internet.

This funding is part of Alberta’s overall $390-million commitment to improve access to high-speed internet. It will be used to implement solutions to connect rural, remote, and Indigenous communities that do not currently have access to federal target speeds of 50 megabits per second (Mbps) for downloads, and 10 Mbps for uploads.

It introduces multiple streams that address key priorities to help us bridge connectivity gaps left by the Universal Broadband Fund (UBF).

Eligibility

The ABF is using many of the same eligibility and assessment criteria requirements used for the UBF. For example, we will be using the same definitions for eligible applicants and eligible activities.

The ABF is open to eligible applicants, including Canadian corporations, municipalities, Indigenous entities, and partnerships of those groups.

It supports projects that extend or enhance household access to high-speed internet services in areas with speeds less than federal targets of 50 Mbps for downloads and 10 Mbps for uploads. Funding for these projects is currently available until March 31, 2027.

The ABF provides funding for new broadband projects in Alberta. To be eligible, a project cannot have an application for federal or other broadband projects currently in progress.

Each stream will also define its own specific requirements.

Stream 1 - Closed

Stream 1, Service Availability Challenges, was centred on closing connectivity gaps in currently underserved communities.

Stream 1 was used to address communities where the community believed the delivered internet speeds are below the federal target of 50 megabits per second (Mbps) for downloads and 10 Mbps for uploads, despite federally mapped service availability claims indicating target speeds are available.

To be eligible for funding, applicants were required to prove that mapped speeds indicated on the federal broadband service availability map are inaccurate. Submissions required applicant verification that broadband services are:

  • Not and will not be available through current service providers
  • Not accessible to a sizable portion of existing or new households in the area

Applications were open from December 20, 2022, to March 20, 2023. This intake is closed.

Eligibility

In addition to the basic eligibility outlined above, applications had to meet additional criteria:

  • Must be submitted by a community or internet service provider
  • Must use ABF templates to provide evidence that clearly demonstrates minimal federal target speeds are not available from any service providers in the area
  • Must receive written endorsement of the evidence from Government of Alberta staff
  • Must improve internet speeds in an area that does not have access 50 Mbps for downloads and 10 Mbps for uploads.
  • Must not include areas with access to federal target speeds, except for areas where challenges have been endorsed.
  • Must provide open access to Points of Presence that are components of the project.
  • Must not include any areas or households that are recipients of any other federal or provincial broadband funding programs. Examples include but are not limited to:

Stream 2 - Closed

This stream is closed. Under the Stream 2 call for interest, the Governments of Alberta and Canada invited eligible applicants under the UBF to express their interest in developing a proposal to connect underserved households in areas of the province without access to Internet speeds of 50/10 Mbps. Stream funding was available until March 31, 2027, and projects must be completed by that date.

Stream 2 focused on the most densely populated areas without service as indicated on the attached map. Densely populated areas outside of this map were either already considered served or to be served through existing projects, including those under the UBF.

Under the UBF, eligible applicants were:

  1. Canadian entities or groups of Canadian entities that operate broadband infrastructure; or
  2. Canadian entities or groups of entities that do not operate broadband infrastructure but have identified a plan to engage an entity or group of entities with experience building, owning, and operating the infrastructure their project(s) is proposing may also be eligible.

When the stream was open, eligible applicants were invited to submit expressions of interest by November 8, 2024.

For more information visit:

Stream 3 - 2025

This stream will support the most remote and hardest to connect households that will not benefit from other broadband expansion projects. A limited number of remote households will be eligible to apply for a one-time grant to off-set the cost of adopting high-speed internet.

More information, including dates and specific eligibility criteria, is expected to be shared in 2025.

Contact

Connect with the Alberta Broadband Fund: 

Hours: 8:15 am to 4:30 pm (open Monday to Friday, closed statutory holidays)
Email: [email protected]

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