The technology agreement with Power of Kairos aims to bring the first Kairos small modular reactor into operation by 2030, followed by additional deployments through 2035.
The companies did not disclose financial details of the deal or where in the U.S. the plants would be built. Google said it agreed to purchase a total of 500 megawatts of power from six to seven reactors, which is less than the output of current nuclear reactors.
“We believe nuclear power can play an important role in helping meet our demand… in a clean way and in a way that runs 24 hours a day,” Michael Terrell, senior director of energy and climate at Google, on a call.
Technology companies have signed several recent agreements with nuclear power companies this year as artificial intelligence increases energy demand for the first time in decades.
In March, Amazon.com purchased a nuclear-powered data center from Talen Energy. Last month, Microsoft and Constellation Energy signed an energy deal to help resurrect a unit at the Three Mile Island plant in Pennsylvania, the site of America’s worst nuclear accident in 1979.
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U.S. data center energy use is expected to roughly triple between 2023 and 2030 and will require about 47 gigawatts of new generating capacity, according to Goldman Sachs estimates, which assumed that natural gas, wind and solar energy would fill the gap. Kairos will need to obtain full construction and design permits from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, as well as permits from local agencies, a process that can take years.
Late last year, Kairos obtained a construction permit from the NRC to build a demonstration reactor in Tennessee.
“The NRC stands ready to efficiently and appropriately review applications for new reactors,” said NRC spokesman Scott Burnell.
The small modular reactors are intended to be smaller than current reactors with components built in a factory, rather than on site, to reduce construction costs.
Critics say SMRs will be expensive because they may not be able to achieve the economies of scale of larger plants. In addition, they are likely to produce long-lived nuclear waste for which the country does not yet have a final repository.
Google said that by committing to the so-called backlog framework with Kairos, rather than purchasing one reactor at a time, it is sending a demand signal to the market and making a long-term investment to accelerate the development of SMRs.
“We are confident that this novel approach will improve the prospects of our projects being delivered on cost and on schedule,” said Mike Laufer, CEO and co-founder of Kairos.
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