Big Tech is going nuclear. In the past week, Amazon agreed with utilities in Washington state to support development of four next-generation “small modular reactors”, with a similar deal in Virginia, and took a stake in X-energy, an SMR developer. Google agreed to buy power from SMRs to be built by a start-up, Kairos Power. And last month Microsoft agreed a 20-year power purchasing deal that will entail Constellation Energy reopening a unit at the Three Mile Island plant in Pennsylvania that was shuttered in 2019 (not the one closed in 1979 after a partial meltdown).
大型科技公司正在进军核能。上周，亚马逊(Amazon)与华盛顿州的公用事业公司达成协议，将支持开发四座下一代“小型模块化反应堆”(SMR)，该公司与弗吉尼亚州也达成了类似协议，并入股了小型模块化反应堆开发商X-energy。谷歌(Google)签约向初创公司Kairos Power将要建造的小型模块化反应堆购买电力。上月，微软(Microsoft)达成了一项为期20年的电力购买协议，该协议将要求Constellation Energy重启宾夕法尼亚州三里岛核电站于2019年关闭的一个机组（不是1979年因部分熔毁而关闭的那个机组）。