In a vivid sign of how demand for computing is driving a resurgence of US nuclear power, the Trump administration yesterday agreed a $1bn loan to help reboot the mothballed Three Mile Island nuclear power station in Pennsylvania to provide electricity to Microsoft.
The station is infamous for the partial meltdown of the second of its two reactors in 1979. It’s deemed the worst accident in US commercial nuclear history, although its limited radioactive releases had no detectable health effects on plant workers or the public.
The first reactor continued generating until 2019, when it was shut down owing to the abundance of cheaper natural gas, which made the plant economically unviable.
In September last year, that reactor’s owner, Constellation Energy, signed a 20-year power-purchase agreement with Microsoft based on restarting unit 1, which it said would add 835MW to the multi-state PMJ electricity grid.
The idea is to match the electricity the tech giant uses for data centres in the PMJ grid.
Online in 2027
Announcing the $1bn, interest-bearing loan from the US Department of Energy (DOE) yesterday, Constellation noted the administration’s eagerness, saying it was the first time the DOE Loan Programs Office had finalised both a conditional loan commitment and the deal’s financial close at the same time.
Constellation has rebranded the unit as the “Crane Clean Energy Centre”, and hopes to bring it back online in 2027.
The company said more than 500 employees, including engineers, mechanics, technicians and licensed operator trainees were onsite conducting inspections and regulatory reviews.
As GCR reports today, construction spending in August was down substantially in most sectors, but spending on data centres was up 26% year-on-year. Spending on power projects was up 2.1%.
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