The owner of the shuttered Three Mile Island nuclear plant is pursuing a $1.6 billion federal loan guarantee to help finance its plan to restart the Pennsylvania facility and sell the electricity to Microsoft to power data centers, according to details of the application shared with The Washington Post. Get a curated selection of 10 of our best stories in your inbox every weekend.

The taxpayer-backed loan could give Microsoft and Three Mile Island owner Constellation Energy a major boost in their unprecedented bid to steer all the power from a U.S. nuclear plant to a single company.

Microsoft, which declined to comment on the bid for a loan guarantee, is among the large tech companies scouring the nation for zero-emissions power as they seek to build data centers. It is among the leaders in the global competition to dominate the field of artificial intelligence, which consumes enormous amounts of electricity.

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  • adarza@lemmy.caEnglish
    59·
    2 months ago

    if microsoft wants the power, they can pay for it. up front, and entirely. including assuming liability for when something goes wrong, and for the ongoing storage of waste materials and the eventual decommission/clean-up of the site.

    • Cethin@lemmy.zipEnglish
      122·
      2 months ago

      Three mile island has operated for decades safely. It closes in 2019 IIRC due to it being unprofitable, because methane was so cheap. Safety isn’t an issue.

      Storage of waste is very simple. It requires a very small area, and most of the waste will be neutral in a very short period of time. The stuff that isn’t is still easy to store safely. We have plenty of solutions available for this. It’s also a non-issue.

      Regardless, I agree they need to pay for the cost. If the electricity isn’t going to the people then the people shouldn’t be paying for it. Unless M$ is providing the AI garbage free of charge to the public then they get nothing out of it, and even then it would be of debatable utility.

      Edit: After reading this, I’m actually not that upset. The company is valued at $80 billion apparently. There’s very little chance they default on the loan. It’s not like they’re getting the money for free. They’re just getting a loan from the Energy Department. Still, if it’s only for private use then the loan should be handled through private entities. They should go take the loan the banks offer. The only reason they’re taking this one instead is because it’s a better deal. They don’t deserve a better deal if it isn’t in the public interest.

    • RedditWanderer@lemmy.world
      7·
      2 months ago

      No see that would go against big techs plan to increase their value tenfold on the back of taxpayers because “we need it”. Fuck these guys

    • krelvar@lemmy.world
      71·
      2 months ago

      That’s not at all how it works. Micro$oft paid a LOT for those congresscritters, precisely so they DON’T have to pay for it. We do. We always do.