Google has struck a deal with startup Kairos Power to use small modular nuclear reactors ( SMRs ) to provide low-carbon electricity for its energy-intensive data centres, the Financial Times (FT) reports .
The company has placed an order for 500 MW of SMRs, which would allow the first commercial reactor to be operational by 2030 and additional reactors by 2035, the FT reported.
The agreement marks “a milestone in our 15-year journey toward clean energy” for Google, said Michael Terrell, the company’s senior director of energy and climate. He also noted that SMRs offer a simpler, inherently safer design, faster construction, and flexibility in location compared with large-scale nuclear plants.
Kairos, based in Alameda, California, has developed a reactor cooled not by water but by molten fluoride salt. In December, the company received a permit to build a 50-megawatt demonstration reactor in Tennessee called Hermes. It was the first permit for a new type of reactor in the U.S. in half a century.
The Google-Kairos deal is the first in which a tech company is helping to commission a nuclear power plant. Both companies declined to comment on the value of the agreement or whether Google would finance the construction of the SMRs up front or simply pay for the electricity once they are built.
Earlier, Rostelecom allowed all Google services to be blocked in Russia.