하이퍼스케일러 대기업들이 AI 인프라 구축을 위해 전력을 직접 인수하고 자체 발전소를 건설하고 있다.

A nuclear power plant shuttered for six years is restarting because of AI.

On September 8, the U.S. Department of Energy announced a loan of up to $1.9 billion to NextEra Energy to restart the Duane Arnold Nuclear Power Plant in Iowa, which ceased operation in 2020. The plant has an installed capacity of 615 megawatts—the only nuclear facility in the state. Under the plan, it will reconnect to the grid in 2029, pending approval from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Behind the restart lies a long-term contract: Google has committed to purchasing most of the electricity generated by the plant for 25 years.

This is not the first U.S. nuclear plant being revived for AI. Microsoft signed a 20-year contract to support the restart of Unit 1 of Three Mile Island Nuclear Power Plant in Pennsylvania, which shut down in 2019.

Beyond nuclear, Meta, Amazon, and Google are accelerating investments in small modular reactor projects. Elon Musk is taking a more direct approach: xAI is building its own 1.2 gigawatt natural gas power plant, with plans for SpaceX to produce key turbine components in-house.

From nuclear to geothermal, from natural gas to small reactors, AI giants are moving upstream into the energy supply chain. What appeared to be competition over models, chips, and computing power has evolved into a race for electricity itself.

The U.S. power grid is buckling under AI data center demand. According to Reuters, power markets across the Midwest, Mid-Atlantic, and South have received applications from large power-consuming projects totaling over 700 gigawatts of requested capacity—the vast majority from data centers. This is ten times the actual current electricity consumption of all U.S. data centers combined.

These inflated figures reflect speculative applications; many projects haven't been built, and some data centers are simply securing grid slots in advance. Determining actual demand has become nearly impossible.

Texas exemplifies the problem. ERCOT has received grid-connection applications for roughly 700 gigawatts of capacity, approximately 90% data center related. Yet Texas's peak grid load on July 22 reached only 91.1 gigawatts. The state has suspended some applications, requiring revalidation to distinguish genuine projects from phantom demand.

The International Energy Agency projects U.S. electricity demand will grow 2% annually from 2025 to 2030—more than twice the previous decade's average. Data centers account for a substantial portion of this growth. By 2030, data center electricity consumption could represent nearly half of all new U.S. electricity demand.

The bottleneck extends beyond generation. As of late 2025, approximately 8,200 projects await grid connection in the United States, representing 1.3 terawatts of generation capacity and 749 gigawatts of storage. These are not data centers but wind farms, solar installations, gas plants, and batteries—yet the nation is adding electrical demand faster than it can connect new power sources.

Compounding the crisis, America's aging infrastructure is failing. The American Society of Civil Engineers reports 70% of power transformers and 70% of transmission lines have exceeded 25 years of service life. Procurement is the bottleneck: transformer lead times in 2024 ranged from 80 to 210 weeks, averaging 120 weeks. Even if power exists, delivering it to data centers is uncertain.

AI companies are therefore sidestepping the public grid. Google signed a 396-megawatt power purchase agreement with geothermal company Fervo, expected to supply its Utah data center beginning in 2028—even though the facility hasn't been fully approved. Amazon bought a 960-megawatt data center park adjacent to Pennsylvania's Susquehanna Nuclear Plant for $650 million, with plans to expand to 1,920 megawatts through 2042.

Microsoft secured a 20-year agreement with Constellation Energy to restart Three Mile Island's Unit 1, an 835-megawatt facility equivalent to supplying 700,000 households. Originally shut in 2019 for economic reasons, the plant is planned to resume operation in 2027, pending regulatory approval. Microsoft will purchase all the electricity it generates.

These long-term contracts—typically 10 to 20 years—effectively reserve the output of entire power stations for single customers.

Elon Musk has pushed further, deeming purchased power insufficient. xAI's Colossus data center in Greater Memphis initially relied on temporary gas turbines. The company is replacing that temporary infrastructure in Southaven, Mississippi with a permanent 1.2-gigawatt natural gas facility, installing 41 permanent turbines to replace the previous 69 temporary units. More boldly, The Wall Street Journal reported that SpaceX is building a casting facility in Bastrop, Texas to produce turbine blades and deflectors, bringing this critical component of the supply chain in-house.