TerraPower will announce its first deal to power an artificial intelligence data center before the end of 2026, with groundbreaking expected in 2027. The news comes directly from CEO Chris Levesque and marks a clear strategic shift for the Bill Gates-founded startup, which was originally built to serve traditional electric utilities but is now setting its sights on a far more lucrative market.
At the heart of the plan is the Natrium reactor, a 345-megawatt sodium-cooled plant paired with a molten salt thermal energy storage system. The logic is straightforward, even if the engineering is not: the reactor runs at full capacity at all times, without ever throttling down. When electricity demand drops, excess heat is redirected into a large tank of molten salt. When the grid or a data center needs more power, that stored energy is converted into steam to drive the turbines. The result is a plant capable of delivering up to 500 MW for more than five and a half consecutive hours, without any adjustment to the reactor itself.
Why does this feature matter so much to data center operators? AI computing facilities have an irregular consumption profile: intense processing peaks alternate with periods of relative calm. Conventional reactors struggle to follow these rapid fluctuations without losing efficiency. The Natrium was designed to integrate with intermittent renewables — wind and solar — and that same flexibility translates well to data center demand management, which works in mirror fashion: it is not generation that varies, but consumption. Same solution, opposite problem.
TerraPower has not been standing still. In January 2026, the company signed an agreement with Meta to supply eight Natrium units. In June 2025, it closed a $650 million funding round with participation from Nvidia through NVentures, alongside Bill Gates and HD Hyundai. Construction on the first plant is already underway in Kemmerer, Wyoming. Regulatory approval from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is expected by 2026: if granted, the Natrium will become the first advanced nuclear technology to receive commercial approval in the United States. For the construction of additional plants, TerraPower has partnered with Hyundai Engineering and Construction for up to eight units.
All of this is unfolding against the backdrop of a rapidly expanding sector. AI-oriented data centers now consume over 80 MW each — more than double that of standard facilities. In the United States, total data center energy demand is set to double, rising from 17 GW in 2022 to an estimated 35 GW by 2030. Power grids are struggling to keep up, and grid connection timelines can stretch beyond ten years. In this environment, nuclear generation co-located with data centers is no longer a speculative bet — it is a concrete alternative. It is no coincidence that Terrestrial Energy has also signed a deal with Riot Platforms to develop data centers powered by its 390 MW integral molten salt reactors, with a potential capacity of up to 4 GW.
TerraPower has yet to disclose the name of the client for its next project. But the direction is unmistakable. If the Kemmerer reactor secures regulatory approval on schedule, the company will hold a certified technology, a portfolio of agreements with major tech players, and a significant head start over the competition. Nuclear power for data centers is no longer just an idea — it is a timeline with real dates on it.
