Nuclear Armageddon incoming

On January 10 this year, Reuters came out with a report headlined Cancelled NuScale contract weighs heavy on new nuclear. The report detailed the woes of small modular reactor developer NuScale, which had lost a first-of-a-kind supply contract with a Utah power utility after failing to secure enough takes for the future electricity supply. The reason: cost.

Fast-forward 10 months and we get this headline from the FT: Nuclear energy stocks hit record highs on surging demand from AI. In the report, the FT details stock price movements for nuclear power companies including NuScale, following reports that Big Tech mastodons are pouring money into nuclear technology to secure reliable supply for their data centres.

Nuclear was due some much needed vindication after decades of neglect and outright animosity, and not only in Germany, so all this is good news for an industry in need of some. But what’s happening in nuclear right now may have much broader and truly devastating implications for the energy world — more specifically for wind and solar.