Amazon goes nuclear, to invest more than $500 million to develop small modular reactors

Amazon Web Services is investing more than $500 million in nuclear power, announcing three projects from Virginia to Washington state. AWS, Amazon's subsidiary in cloud computing, has a massive and increasing need for clean energy as it expands its services into generative AI. It's also a part of Amazon's path to net-zero carbon emissions.

AWS announced it has signed an agreement with Dominion Energy, Virginia's utility company, to explore the development of a small modular nuclear reactor, or SMR, near Dominion's existing North Anna nuclear power station. Nuclear reactors produce no carbon emissions.

KEY POINTS
• AWS announced it has signed an agreement with Dominion Energy, Virginia's utility company, to explore the development of a small modular nuclear reactor, near Dominion's existing North Anna nuclear power station.
• AWS, Amazon's subsidiary in cloud computing, has a massive and increasing need for clean energy as it expands its services into generative AI. The agreement is also a part of Amazon's path to net-zero carbon emissions.
• Amazon is the latest large tech company to buy into nuclear power to fuel the growing demands from data centers. Google and Microsoft have announced similar plans.