Microsoft's Next Big Acquisition Is Enough Nuclear Power To Fuel Its AI Ambitions For Decades

The Three Mile Island nuclear power plant--the site where an infamous partial nuclear meltdown occurred in 1979--might have a new owner soon. Microsoft has signed a power purchase agreement with the current owner of the plant, Constellation, and the deal now needs to go through regulators to be approved. If successful, Microsoft will have exclusive rights to 100% of the output from the plant for 20 years, which will be used to fuel its AI data center requirements.

Interestingly, the plant is located next to a unit that was shut down in 1979 after the Three-Mile Island accident, but it was retired in 2019. Microsoft will reopen it if the sale goes through, and it's expected to generate 837 megawatts of energy, enough power for more than 800,000 homes.

Of course, this power will be used for its AI ambitions and data centers, initiatives that require vast amounts of resources to keep the lights on. This new focus on AI has seen an increase in greenhouse gas emissions from Microsoft, a company that has previously pledged to reduce its carbon footprint, but the company says the nuclear power plant will help it transition to clean energy.

"This agreement is a major milestone in Microsoft's efforts to help decarbonize the grid in support of our commitment to become carbon negative," Bobby Hollis, vice president of energy at Microsoft said (via The Verge). "Microsoft continues to collaborate with energy providers to develop carbon-free energy sources to help meet the grids' capacity and reliability needs."

Constellation plans to invest $1.6 billion to revive the plant, pending approval from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and other local agencies.

Microsoft has previously spoken about its plans to heavily invest in AI. Tim Stuart, the CFO of Xbox, recently spoke about how he expects AI to impact the future of gaming at Xbox and the company is developing an AI-powered chatbot for Xbox.