Metas’ big move to go green with nuclear power is turning heads. They just inked a 20-year deal with Constellation Energy, a major US power player. This means Meta will tap into Constellations’ Illinois nuclear plants for power and buy clean energy credits to offset any dirty energy use elsewhere.
Mark Zuckerberg, Meta’s CEO, says this deal will help the company hit its goal of creating a super-advanced AI model using clean energy. Constellation Energy is no small fry – it owns the largest independent nuclear power plant in the US.
Meta is going all-in on AI infrastructure investments. Just last April, they upped their 2025 budget to $64-72 billion, a significant bump from the initial $60-65 billion. And, fun fact, they mostly use Nvidia’s AI chips for all their AI work.
This nuclear power deal is just the beginning. Meta is also exploring ways to boost US nuclear power production by 1-4 gigawatts starting in the 2030s. They expect to finalize some of these projects by the end of this year.
As Meta puts it, “investing in nuclear power will give us the energy infrastructure we need to drive AI innovation, boost economic growth, and prepare our communities for the future.” Nuclear power is a perfect match for massive data centers that need reliable energy 24/7 – unlike wind or solar power, which can be unreliable on calm or cloudy days.
This move shows that big tech companies are making long-term commitments to support AI growth. The industry is looking for stable, long-term energy solutions – not just for next year or the year after, but for decades to come. This is a good sign for the sector’s confidence in AI.
This isn’t the first nuclear power deal of its kind. Last year, Alphabet and Amazon.com agreed to fund the development of small nuclear reactors that could power data centers as early as 2030. And previously, Microsoft struck a deal with Constellation Energy to buy power from a reactivated reactor at Three Mile Island.
Expect more big tech companies to follow suit with nuclear power deals. It’s an industry to watch.