TECH NEWS – The Three Mile Island plant was once the site of one of the largest nuclear power plant disasters in the United States, and hopefully that won’t happen under Microsoft!
The Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania, USA, is being restarted by Constellation Energy to fulfill an agreement with Microsoft to power the Redmond-based tech giant’s data centers with carbon-free energy. This plant partially melted down in 1979. That was TMI Unit 2 (and it hasn’t been operational since), but its neighbor, Unit 1, was restarted in 1985 and will remain operational until 2019. Then, according to Constellation, it was shut down because it wasn’t economically viable.
After refurbishment and obtaining the necessary federal and state permits, Constellation hopes to have TMI Unit 1 up and running by 2028, and says that restarting the reactor will add about 835 MW of carbon-free power to the grid. The plant will be named the Crane Clean Energy Center after Chris Crane, the nuclear energy “titan” who died earlier this year. The plans have the support of state politicians and the U.S. Department of Energy. Dr. Michael Goff, acting assistant secretary for the department’s Office of Nuclear Energy, said that continued carbon-free nuclear power is an important part of fighting climate change and meeting the country’s growing energy needs.
Microsoft data centers provide the infrastructure for cloud hosting and services that require computing power (artificial intelligence). Bobby Holls, Microsoft’s vice president of energy, said the deal with Constellation is the company’s largest ever and marks a significant milestone in its efforts to help decarbonize the grid. Microsoft has been rumored to be looking at smaller, modular reactors and micro-reactors to power its data centers.
Microsoft founder Bill Gates started a company called TerraPower in 2006 that’s in the nuclear power business. The company’s new power plant opened in Wyoming earlier this year. In June, he told NPR that electric cars, buses, and heat pumps will increase demand for electricity, and data centers will contribute. And for that, Microsoft needs its own nuclear power plant…
Source: PCGamer, Constellation, NPR
