Big Tech backs nuclear power

Microsoft, Google, Amazon, and Meta are no longer waiting for utilities to find extra electricity for artificial intelligence. They are signing long contracts, financing reactor developers, and in some cases helping bring specific nuclear plants online. (reuters.com) The trigger is simple: a modern data center is not just a warehouse of servers, but a giant electricity customer that runs every hour of the day. A Congressional Research Service report said United States data centers used about 176 terawatt-hours in 2023, or roughly 4.4% of national electricity use. (congress.gov) That share is rising fast. The Electric Power Research Institute said in February 2026 that data centers could reach 9% to 17% of United States electricity generation by 2030, up from about 4% to 5% today. (publicpower.org) Nuclear power solves a specific problem that wind and solar do not solve on their own: it runs all day and all night. For a company training artificial intelligence models, that steady flow is like owning a factory that cannot afford a surprise blackout at 3 a.m. (reuters.com) Google made one of the clearest bets in October 2024 when it agreed to buy power from Kairos Power’s small modular reactors. Google said the deal could deliver up to 500 megawatts of round-the-clock carbon-free electricity, with the first reactor targeted for 2030 and more deployments through 2035. (blog.google) A small modular reactor is a nuclear reactor designed to be built in smaller pieces, more like assembling trucks than pouring one giant custom skyscraper. Amazon said in October 2024 that it had signed three agreements to support that kind of reactor build-out, including funding tied to X-energy and a Washington project with Energy Northwest. (aboutamazon.com) (x-energy.com) (energy-northwest.com) Microsoft chose a different route: restart a reactor that already exists. In September 2024, Constellation and Microsoft announced a 20-year power purchase agreement tied to restarting Three Mile Island Unit 1 in Pennsylvania, now renamed the Crane Clean Energy Center, with about 835 megawatts of carbon-free output. (constellationenergy.com) (microsoft.com) Meta has gone even bigger on paper. In January 2026, Meta said its agreements with Vistra, TerraPower, and Oklo, plus an earlier Constellation deal, could unlock up to 6.6 gigawatts of nuclear capacity, including 2.8 gigawatts of baseload generation and 1.2 gigawatts of built-in storage. (about.fb.com) None of this means reactors appear quickly. Kairos Power’s Hermes test reactor received a construction permit from the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission in December 2023, and Hermes 2 received permits in November 2024, which shows how much of the work is still licensing, testing, and step-by-step approval. (nrc.gov 1) (nrc.gov 2) The political fight starts before the reactors do. North Carolina public radio station WUNC reported on April 10 that Duke Energy says only about one-third of incoming business projects are data centers, but those projects account for 80% of projected demand from new economic growth in the state. (wunc.org) That is why residents are pushing back on utility deals and rate plans. WUNC also reported that North Carolina regulators are weighing how to stop households and small businesses from paying for grid upgrades and new power plants built mainly for large data-center customers. (wunc.org 1) (wunc.org 2) The old model was that technology companies rented computing power and bought electricity from whoever served the region. The new model is that electricity itself is becoming part of the technology stack, with reactor contracts sitting next to chip orders and land deals. (reuters.com)