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).
大型科技公司正在進軍核能。上週，亞馬遜(Amazon)與華盛頓州的公用事業公司達成協議，將支持開發四座下一代「小型模塊化反應堆」(SMR)，該公司與維吉尼亞州也達成了類似協議，併入股了小型模塊化反應堆開發商X-energy。谷歌(Google)簽約向新創公司Kairos Power將要建造的小型模塊化反應堆購買電力。上月，微軟(Microsoft)達成了一項爲期20年的電力購買協議，該協議將要求Constellation Energy重啓賓州三里島核電站於2019年關閉的一個機組（不是1979年因部分熔燬而關閉的那個機組）。