NY State to site 1 GW nuke as AI bit barns guzzle power

New York State is set to build America's first major new nuclear plant in more than 15 years, amid growing energy demands, particularly from power-hungry AI datacenters.

The New York Power Authority has been instructed to find a site in upstate New York and decide on a design for the reactor project, according to an interview in the Wall Street Journal with Governor Kathy Hochul.

It says that the project aims to add at least 1 gigawatt of generating capacity to that of New York's existing nuclear plants, and that this should be roughly enough to power about a million American homes. 

No date was specified for when this nuclear plant is expected to come online, nor was any figure mentioned for how much the project is likely to cost. We asked the Governor's office, and will update if we get answers.

Meanwhile, the Empire State currently hosts about 219 datacenters, according to Datacenters.com. This number is likely to increase as companies rush to add additional facilities to serve the rising requirements driven by all the AI hype.

Compounding this growing demand, New York's capacity was dealt a significant blow when the Indian Point Energy Center, located roughly 36 miles north of New York City, shut down its last two nuclear reactors in 2021, cutting off about 25 percent of the city's electricity supply.

A report last year by management consultancy Bain & Company warned that US energy providers needed to adapt quickly to the rising demand, as power consumption was forecast to outstrip supply within the next few years.

That urgency is sharpened by timing constraints: although several new nuclear projects have been announced to meet the projected needs of AI and emerging technologies like electric vehicles, most of these are unlikely to start producing power until the next decade, while more energy is needed now.

President Trump signed an executive order back in May aiming to quadruple US nuclear generating capacity from 100GW to 400GW by 2050, coming a few weeks after a group of large-scale energy users, including Amazon, Meta, and Google, called for efforts to triple global nuclear capacity by the same date. Amazon recently finalized a deal to buy nuclear energy for its facilities in Pennsylvania as it plans to build a host of new "high-tech cloud computing and artificial intelligence innovation campuses" in the state, according to an announcement earlier this month.

• AI datacenters want to go nuclear. Too bad they needed it yesterday
• Amazon, Meta, Google sign pledge to triple nuclear power capacity by 2050
• With datacenter power crisis looming, US government looks to Constellation
• South Carolina's abandoned nuclear reactors positioned to fuel the AI datacenter boom

Against this backdrop, carbon-free energy biz Constellation welcomed the news of New York's ambition to add more nuclear energy to the state's power grid.

"It is yet another recognition of nuclear energy's critical role in achieving the nation's leading clean energy goals. We look forward to working with the Governor and state leaders to ensure nuclear energy continues to power economic growth and a clean, affordable and reliable energy future for New York," said Constellation Chief Legal and Policy Officer David Dardis. ®