For much of the past 40 years, nuclear power has been in a funk in the U.S., though according to the U.S. Department of Energy it still produces nearly 20% of U.S. electricity and is the country’s largest single source of clean, emission-free electricity.
Cost overruns, financing problems, mammoth regulatory delays, and low-cost U.S. produced natural gas have led dozens of plants to close, with few new ones opening.
The shining star of success in the nuclear industry is uprates – the process by which nuclear engineers make existing reactors more efficient while increasing their maximum generating capacity. And uprates are about to kick into high gear.
Constellation Energy recently announced agreements with Google and Amazon that will drive uprates at 13 nuclear reactors in four states, increasing output by a cumulative 1,080 megawatts. That is enough electricity to serve approximately one million average size U.S. homes. All the new power is scheduled to be available by 2032.
The reactors are at nuclear plants in Maryland, Illinois, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, where communities will get significant economic stimulus from the projects. This includes 7,200 new construction jobs.
Uprates are reviewed and approved by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). The NRC says on its website, “Over the past 20 years, we’ve approved uprates that have given the nation’s electricity grid an additional six gigawatts.” That is enough power to meet the average use of more than five million homes.
Indeed, the October 6 announcement by Google and Constellation Energy for 890 megawatts of new electricity through uprates is one of the most important and under-appreciated announcements pertaining to clean energy, data centers, and electricity infrastructure.
In the press release, Constellation said, “By modernizing and upgrading turbines, steam generators, and digital control systems at operating plants, uprates deliver substantial capacity gains without the multi-year timelines or interconnection bottlenecks associated with greenfield construction.”
Constellation is able to proceed with confidence on the ambitious uprates as Google has signed a 20-year power purchase agreement that includes the 890 megawatts from the uprates and a separate 15-year agreement for 2,700 additional megawatts from Constellation. This enables Constellation to invest more than $4.3 billion in uprates.
Google said, “Our agreement with Constellation to fund nuclear reactor uprates will strengthen the PJM grid, which serves 67 million people, all while protecting energy affordability and supporting local union jobs.”
On September 30, Constellation and Amazon announced a 20-year power purchase agreement for 690 megawatts of power that will directly lead to 190 new megawatts of power generated through an uprate. “The agreement will enable more than $3 billion in Maryland infrastructure investment, including state-of-the-art improvements” at the Calvert Cliffs nuclear plant, said Constellation.
It also said, “Amazon’s long-term commitment will help provide Constellation with the revenue certainty to relicense the plant for another 20 years and make progress toward the development of new clean energy power plants at the site.”
The Google and Amazon announcements are one of the ways the companies are implementing the Ratepayer Protection Pledge. This is President Donald Trump’s demand to ensure that data centers secure the power they need and pay for the electricity and infrastructure required, without passing those costs on to other ratepayers.
Both Amazon and Google have also made major investments in new nuclear energy technologies, such as small modular reactors. If successful and approved, these could lead to transformative increases in power supply and lower costs while producing abundant, emissions-free power.
For the past 40 years, the nuclear power industry has weathered major challenges and found creative and innovative ways to survive and expand. Large, sweeping agreements with America’s most innovative tech companies, like Amazon and Google, may be the last, best chance for the industry to truly have a renaissance, which will profoundly benefit American consumers as well.
Paul Steidler is a Senior Fellow with the Lexington Institute, a public policy think tank in Arlington, VA.
This article was originally published by RealClearEnergy and made available via RealClearWire.
