The US Department of Energy on Monday closed a $1.9 billion loan to NextEra Energy to refurbish and restart the 615-megawatt Duane Arnold Energy Center in Palo, Iowa, the second time in a year that Washington has bankrolled a mothballed reactor's return to serve a hyperscaler.
Google Anchors The Load
The output will flow to Google, which is planning to build up to six data centers around the plant to run its US AI workloads. Only 50 megawatts is being carved out for the local rural electric cooperative, enough to cover 18% of Iowa's data-center-driven demand growth since 2021, according to CEO John Ketchum's earlier earnings comments.
Second Zombie Reactor In A Year
Duane Arnold shut down in 2020 after a derecho damaged its cooling towers. It follows Constellation Energy's $1 billion DOE loan to restart Three Mile Island for Microsoft, and Meta's separate all-in offtake at Constellation's Clinton nuclear plant. Deputy Energy Secretary James Danly said the restart will "drive down electricity costs" in Iowa, though NextEra plans to squeeze an additional 14 MW out of the plant in refurbishment.
Why It Matters For AI
Data center electricity demand is projected to nearly triple by 2035, and utilities are struggling to add firm, clean baseload fast enough. Restarting a fully permitted 615 MW reactor is politically easier — and roughly a decade faster — than building a new gigawatt-scale plant from scratch. Duane Arnold, Three Mile Island and Clinton together represent the last low-hanging fruit; a Utility Dive report suggests California's San Onofre would be the next candidate, at much greater cost.
The Trump Nuclear Turn
The award confirms that the Trump administration is treating nuclear restarts as a strategic AI asset. NextEra now expects the plant to return to service in early 2029, running under a fresh Nuclear Regulatory Commission license and a Google power purchase agreement.
Reporting based on coverage from TechCrunch, the US Department of Energy, Engadget and Power Magazine.