Google will power its data centers from nuclear microreactors

Google announced it has signed an agreement with nuclear energy startup Kairos Power to build small reactors to power its data centers. As part of the agreement, the company will receive 500 MW of carbon-free electricity – now the demand for power supplies for data centers and AI has skyrocketed.

Image source: youtube.com/@Google

The new power plants, Google said, should be operational by the end of the decade. It is not yet clear whether the company’s facilities will be connected directly, that is, “outside the meter,” or whether the electricity will be supplied to the general network. Google is following the example of Microsoft and Amazon, which have turned to nuclear power to meet their electricity needs. In March, Amazon announced its intention to build a data center in Pennsylvania and connect it directly to a nearby nuclear power plant; Microsoft in September agreed with Constellation Energy to restart the Three Mile Island reactor, which was closed in 2019.

If Kairos meets the 2030 deadline, it will be ahead of its own projections – back in July, the company planned to launch commercial operation of its facilities by the early 2030s. But it will have to compete with startups that have chosen the direction of thermonuclear fusion – they intend to launch industrial power plants before 2035. Kairos is a startup that specializes in small modular nuclear reactors (SMRs), which promise to make nuclear power plants cheaper and faster to build. Most existing nuclear power plants are large-scale facilities, generating 1000 MW or more, but their design takes years and construction takes decades. In 2023 and 2024, Vogtle blocks 3 and 4 were put into operation in American Georgia – before that, the new facility was launched only in 2016; the launch of the units was seven years late, and the budget was exceeded by $17 billion.

SMR startups are trying to make nuclear reactor construction faster and cheaper by using mass production methods to cut costs and speed up construction. Kairos, in addition, proposes to cool the reactors not with water, but with molten salts of lithium fluoride and beryllium fluoride; the company also received approval to build a 35 MW demonstration reactor. However, while commercial SMRs have not yet entered service, their economics remain largely untested. Kairos’ molten salt design has yet to prove its superiority over water cooling, which has decades of experience behind it.

Public opinion remains an important aspect: 56% of Americans support nuclear energy, while 44% remain opposed, according to Pew Research. This figure may change as reactor sites are selected: respondents were asked about the prospects for the industry as a whole, but were not warned that reactors could appear near populated areas. Many more people support wind and solar energy – they are available today and are cheaper than new nuclear power plants.