Amazon Backs Plan for Nuclear Plant in Indiana

Amazon is helping to fund a proposed nuclear power plant in Indiana. The plant would produce 960 megawatts of power, and Amazon would be the first customer to buy that power. The companies announced the deal on Monday, according to TechCrunch.

American Electric Power (AEP) would operate the plant, while X-energy would supply the reactors. X-energy designs small modular nuclear reactors. The plant would consist of 12 Xe-100 small modular reactors.

The plant would be built on the site of a demolished coal power plant just south of Terre Haute. The Indiana reactors would be connected to the public electric grid. Amazon says the power would also serve its data centers.

This deal is the second commercial agreement between Amazon and X-energy. It is three times larger than the first agreement, which was announced two years ago. In October 2024, Amazon led a $700 million Series C-1 funding round for X-energy.

The two companies plan to build 5 gigawatts of new nuclear generating capacity in the United States by 2039. X-energy went public in April, when it debuted on the Nasdaq in an IPO priced at $23 per share. Its shares rose 27% on the first day of trading, but they have since dropped by nearly two-thirds.

News of the Amazon deal sent X-energy shares up about 10% in premarket trading. At the time of publication, the shares were down by less than 2%.

X-energy has not yet broken ground at another site, Seadrift, near Houston, Texas. For the timeline to hold, X-energy must deliver its first power plant there, at a Dow Chemical plant. Seadrift will host four Xe-100 reactors to provide heat and electricity to the chemical plant. The state of Texas has filed a lawsuit about the site, accusing it of habitual non-compliance with water and solid-waste regulations and permits.

X-energy's construction permit is in the final phases of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission's review process. Experts say mass manufacturing often does not produce benefits for about a decade.