Nuclear know-how firm X-Power introduced that it has raised $500 million in a Collection C-1 financing spherical, with proceeds geared toward supporting the commercialization of the corporate’s small modular nuclear (SMR) reactor know-how.
The financing spherical was led by Amazon’s Local weather Pledge Fund, and was introduced alongside plans to make use of X-Power’s reactor design to help a 320 MW mission with regional utility Power Northwest in central Washington, in addition to a collaboration between the businesses to deliver greater than 5 GW of tasks on-line throughout the U.S. by 2039, representing the most important industrial deployment goal of SMRs thus far.
Amazon pledged in 2019 to match all the electrical energy consumed throughout its world operations, together with knowledge facilities, company buildings, shops and success facilities, with 100% renewable power by 2030. Whereas the corporate introduced in July 2024 that it achieved its 100% clear power objective 7 years forward of schedule, it additionally acknowledged on the time that the rising demand for generative AI “would require completely different sources of power than we initially projected,” and that it’ll discover new carbon-free power sources along with its continued investments in renewables.
Kevin Miller, Amazon’s Vice President of World Information Facilities, mentioned:
“This collaboration between Amazon and X-energy is a major step towards accelerating superior nuclear applied sciences that may assist us deliver new sources of carbon-free power to the grid cost-effectively and safely. We’d like good options that may assist us meet rising power calls for whereas additionally addressing local weather change. X-energy’s know-how can be integral in serving to obtain this, and is a vital step in Amazon’s work to attain our Local weather Pledge dedication to be net-zero by 2040.”
SMRs are superior nuclear reactors which are considerably smaller than conventional nuclear energy crops, offering advantages together with sooner construct occasions and the flexibility to be deployed nearer to the grid, whereas producing carbon-free power.
Based in 2009, Rockville, Maryland-based X-Power is a developer of nuclear reactor and gas know-how. The corporate’s TRISO-X gas seals uranium particles in a protecting coating, which might face up to excessive temperatures with out melting, making it extremely proof against gas failure and launch of radioactive supplies, eliminating the necessity for large containment amenities. The corporate’s SMR reactor, Xe-100 is a high-temperature gas-cooled reactor operates at temperatures greater than 750°C, and accommodates greater than 200,000 TRISO-X-based gas pebbles, that are gravity-fed in steady rotation by means of the core, permitting the reactor to run with out gas interruption for 60 years. Helium is circulated by means of the core, absorbing immense warmth, and is used to boil water into steam to show a turbine for the manufacturing of carbon-free power.
The preliminary settlement with Amazon will help a 4-unit 320 MW mission, with the choice to extend to 12 SMR items producing 960 MW.
X-energy CEO J. Clay Promote mentioned:
“Amazon and X-energy are poised to outline the way forward for superior nuclear power within the industrial market. To completely notice the alternatives obtainable by means of synthetic intelligence, we should deliver clear, protected, and dependable electrons onto the grid with confirmed applied sciences that may scale and develop with demand.”
Extra traders within the financing spherical included Citadel Founder and CEO Ken Griffin, associates of Ares Administration Company, NGP, and the College of Michigan.
X-Power mentioned that the brand new capital can be used to fund the completion of its reactor design and licensing in addition to the primary section of its TRISO-X gas fabrication facility in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and to help future carbon-free tasks that may use X-energy’s Xe-100 superior SMR reactors.
X-Power Founder and Execuutive Chairman Kam Ghaffarian, Ph.D., mentioned:
“Reaching this milestone is a testomony to the dedication of the X-energy staff and the important power options we’ve constructed. We stay centered on bringing our superior reactor know-how to market, enabling a future powered by sustainable, zero-carbon power.”
