Companies like Meta are interested in nuclear power, but natural gas might be the reality.
It’s been a little over a week since we published Power Hungry, a package that takes a hard look at the expected energy demands of AI. Last week in this newsletter, I broke down the centerpiece of that package, an analysis I did with my colleague James O’Donnell. (In case you’re still looking for an intro, you can check out this Roundtable discussion with James and our editor in chief Mat Honan, or this short segment I did on Science Friday.)
But this week, I want to talk about another story that I also wrote for that package, which focused on nuclear energy. I thought this was an important addition to the mix of stories we put together, because I’ve seen a lot of promises about nuclear power as a saving grace in the face of AI’s energy demand. My reporting on the industry over the past few years has left me a little skeptical.
Tech giants are looking for more energy, but building new reactors takes time.
As I discovered while I continued that line of reporting, building new nuclear plants isn’t so simple or so fast. And as my colleague David Rotman lays out in his story for the package, the AI boom could wind up relying on another energy source: fossil fuels. So what’s going to power AI? Let’s get into it.
