Meta Reaches Huge Nuclear Power Deal for Data Centers

Another Pennsylvania nuclear plant has reached an agreement to supply power to a large AI data center developer as the race among big tech companies race to secure enough electricity for their projects.

Meta recently announced a series of agreements up to 6.6 gigawatts of for nuclear power by 2035. One of them with Vistra, which operates the Beaver Valley nuclear plant in Beaver County and two others in Ohio. The 20-year power purchase agreement is for 2,176 megawatts (MW) of capacity from Beaver Valley and the Perry and Davis-Besse plants in Ohio, and additional 433 MW of additional generation capacity, also called uprates, that will be added.

The deal will help finance the expansions and lengthen the lifespan of the plants, and add additional jobs, the release states. The power will be purchased by Meta but the electricity from the reactors will go to the PJM regional electric grid. Financial details were not released.

The other deals announced by Meta will back nuclear reactor projects with TerraPower and Oklo, two companies that are developing next-generation small modular reactors. The deal will provide funding to support development of the new reactors, providing the companies will greater certainty and capital.

The TerraPower agreement will support development of two units that will supply 690 MW of power by 2032, with the rights to energy from up to six other units producing 2.1 GW by 2035. The Oklo agreement will help speed up development of a nuclear campus in Ohio, which will add up to 1.2 GW by 2030.

The deals, along with one last year with Constellation for power from an Illinois nuclear plant, “make Meta one of the most significant corporate purchasers of nuclear power in American history,” said Joel Kaplan, Meta’s chief global affairs officer.

The Meta announcement comes on the heels of several others last year involving Pennsylvania nuclear plants. Amazon reached a power-purchase agreement with the owner of the Susquehanna nuclear plant, and Microsoft reached an agreement for power from the restart of a unit at the Three Mile Island nuclear plant.

The deal comes as the state and Mid-Atlantic regional electric grid operator PJM Interconnection are facing rapidly rising demand for electricity, much of it coming from data center operators, and trying to balance that with maintaining an adequate supply for residential customers and ensuring that electric rates do not continue their upward trend.

The topic is being hotly debated as PJM struggles to develop rules for how large-load customers should connect to the strained grid. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission recently stepped in to offer guidance, and the state Public Utility Commission is considering taking a larger role in PJM’s operation.