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VP @ Equinor | Energy Transition | M&A | LeadershipVP @ Equinor | Energy Transition | M&A | Leadership

Big Tech is going nuclear

On Monday, Google announced they are buying up to seven Small Modular Reactors from Kairos power.

Kairos is a startup who has developed a reactor cooled by molten fluoride salt, rather than water. Not quite sure what that means, but it sounds pretty cool. 

And last month, Microsoft announced a 20 year Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) with Constellation Energy, that will reopen Unit 1 at Three Miles Island in Pennsylvania.

It’s a bit of a paradox.

Three Miles Island shut down in 2019, due to poor economics. It didn’t survive in the power market on its own.

Many say nuclear power is way too expensive. Why go with cost meltdowns when we can build cheap renewables instead? 

But as we know, tech companies Think Different.

They have obviously concluded that electricity markets won’t deliver firm carbon free power through the grid anytime soon. 

AI data centres will be built next to energy production sites that can produce gigawatt-scale, low-cost, low-emission electricity continuously. Basically, next to nuclear power plants, says Meta’s chief AI scientist.

It seems like that’s the kind of energy system the rest of us need as well.

Makes you wonder. 

Have Big Tech understood something policy makes have missed? 

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A response by Michael Kanellos

I's an interesting issue. On one hand, they need power. On the other hand, nuclear is expensive and takes quite a bit of time. Data centers only last 10 to 15 years: that means that if they start today, whatever data center they are matching the reactor to will be decommissioned by the time the reactor is ready to run. Plus the higher costs means higher fees for AI services. 

To be honest, I think this effort will end up being an endorsement for renewables. In the last 15 years, we've installed 179GW of solar, 141GW of wind and 16GW of storage in the last five or so. By contrast, only 4GW of nuclear has been completed and often this new capacity is offline for unplanned outages. If you want speed, scalability and reliability, renewables will be the only way to go.