The AI boom has a power problem. Training and running large AI models requires extraordinary amounts of electricity, and the demand is growing faster than the grid can supply it. Microsoft’s solution, announced in September 2024, was both technically ambitious and historically significant: the company agreed to purchase all electricity from the Three Mile Island Unit 1 reactor in Pennsylvania for the next 20 years.
The deal marked the first time a nuclear reactor would be restarted specifically to meet corporate energy demand. Constellation Energy, which owns the facility, said the Microsoft contract made restarting viable.
Goldman Sachs estimated in 2024 that data centre electricity demand would grow by 160 percent by 2030, driven almost entirely by AI.
“We need a lot of power, and we need it to be clean,” said Brad Smith, Microsoft’s president. “Nuclear is the only source of clean power that is available at the scale we need, on the timeline we need it.”
Microsoft was not alone. Amazon, Google, and Meta all announced significant nuclear energy investments in 2024. The AI industry, which had built much of its public image on sustainability commitments, was quietly becoming one of the most significant drivers of nuclear energy’s revival.
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