U.S. Regulators Block AWS Nuclear Power Deal
U.S. energy regulators on Friday rejected a proposal related to Amazon Web Services’ deal to buy nuclear power for several data centers for artificial intelligence in Pennsylvania, according to a public filing.
In a split vote, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission denied a request to increase the amount of power that would supply the data centers, putting the project in limbo. The agency said it had concerns that offloading a large amount of power from the energy grid, which AWS’ plan entails, could negatively affect customers and the grid’s reliability.
AWS planned to buy up to 1 gigawatt of power from Talen Energy, which owns a nuclear power plant located in Luzerne County, Pa., to power several data centers at the site. The deal, announced in March, was seen as a pathway for AWS to meet its growing need for AI data center power with clean energy, but it has been at the center of a larger debate around whether power serving the grid should be purchased by technology giants.
Willie Phillips, the chairman of FERC, who voted in favor of the plan, said Friday in a press release that “maintaining our nation’s leadership in this ‘era-defining’ technology will require a massive and unprecedented investment in the data centers necessary to develop and operate those AI models. And make no mistake: access to reliable electricity is the lifeblood of those data centers.”
It isn’t clear how AWS will proceed with its planned data center campus in Pennsylvania. It has invested in other nuclear projects in recent weeks. Spokespeople for FERC for AWS did not immediately respond to a request for comment.