Google, Kairos Power plan advanced nuclear plant for Tennessee Valley Authority grid by 2030
Lenoir City, Tennessee, Fort Loudoun Dam was operated by Tennessee Valley Authority.
Jim West | UCG | Universal Images Group | Getty Images
Alphabet Google Companies announced on Monday that Kairos Power will use an advanced nuclear power plant connected to the electricity network of Tennessee Valley Authority by 2030.
TVA agreed to buy 50 Megawatt power from Kairos’s Hermes 2 reactor. According to companies, the first service to sign a power purchasing agreement with an advanced reactor like Hermes 2 in the USA.
Hermes 2, Google and Kairos’ nuclear technology of the company last year to start a commercial scale of an agreement within the scope of an agreement. The reactor’s output is equivalent to approximately 36,000 home consumption. Electricity will strengthen Google’s data centers in Alabama in Montgomery County, Tennessee and Jackson County.
Google, Kairos and TVA, the US, the US, consumers to build the cost of building a hook for the cost of building developed nuclear reactors will be one step closer to deploying, he said.
Companies, Kairos and Google will have a financial risk for the creation of a similar project, he said. In the meantime, TVA provides the flow of income that the facility needs to work through a power purchase agreement.
“We think that this has solved the problem of ensuring that consumers do not have this kind of first cost and risk,” TVA CEO Don Moul said. He said. “But at the same time, innovators like Kairos Power allow leaders like Google to launch it.”
Hermes 2 is expected to start operating in Tennessee, Oak Ridge in 2030. Kairos received a construction permit for the reactor. Nuclear regulation commission In November 2024. Before starting the facility operations, he will need to apply for a business license with NRC.
When asked by CNBC, TVA refused to announce how much to pay for electricity from Hermes 2. Kairos refused to announce the estimated cost of the facility.
To build nuclear again
The United States stopped building nuclear power plants due to major costs and delays that disturbed the industry. Last two The reactors built in Plant Vogtele in Georgia in the United States cost 18 billion dollars from expected and launched operations seven years behind the program in 2023 and 2024. The problems of the project contributed to the bankruptcy of Industry Stalwart Westinghouse.
Beginners such as Kairos believe that their small plants will be faster and more affordable than large reactors such as Vogtes, and will help to initiate a new nuclear construction age in the USA, despite these promises, public services are reluctant to commit to small advanced reactors about the concerns about the first price label.
Meanwhile, technology companies like Google want reliable, carbon -free power to meet the demand from artificial intelligence while adhering to their environmental goals because they invest advanced nuclear. Google ordered with Kairos for a total of 500 Megawatt power reactors aimed at being online by 2035.
The construction iron is placed in Kairos Power Hermes Foundation.
Courtesy: Kairos Power
“We want to help commercialize especially,” said Amanda Peterson Corio, President of Google’s Global Data Center Energy. He said. “We want to see how we can get something bigger than something that can be deployed on a small thing. Hermes 2 is really what the project does.”
In a statement to CEO Mike Laufer, CNBC, one of Kairos’s Hermes 2 targets is to create a standard reactor design that will help reduce the cost of future distributions. Kairos also said that he would improve the supply and manufacturing infrastructure necessary to start on the scale through the construction of Hermes 2.
“We will be ready to distribute a large number of reactors on the same sites to offer this power at affordable prices in a future that is not too far away.” He said. Kairos and Google are investigating the options where future plants will be deployed.
Oak ridge, tva nuke hub
Kairos’s technology is different from the current reactors in the USA. This means that Kairos can use thinner and cheaper materials, because the reactor is not under high pressure. Working at low pressure also has safety advantages.
The 50 Megawatt Factory is much smaller than an average of 1000 megawatts reactors in production in the existing US fleet, which is sufficient to give power to an entire city. Laufer said that the Kairos reactor would raise his output to 75 Megawatt when he was released on a commercial scale.
Hermes 2 will be deployed near the National Laboratory of Oak Ridge, which has a long history of nuclear science based on Manhattan project during World War II. TVA was founded by the congress as a public company to electrify the region during the Great Depression. The public service of the federal government remains.
“This kind of species makes Eastern Tennessee as a regional center for innovation for nuclear construction and operation for nuclear construction and operation, and this will be valuable for the nation.” He said.
