The United States is preparing to provide up to $5 billion in federal loan financing to expand its existing nuclear power fleet. The move comes as surging demand from artificial intelligence drives a search for clean, round-the-clock electricity.

The U.S. Department of Energy has announced a provisional funding agreement with Constellation. Under the plan, the energy firm will receive federal backing to overhaul and upgrade eight nuclear facilities. The selected plants, which comprise eight stations across Illinois, Maryland, and Pennsylvania, house multiple reactor units.

The upgrades will add nearly 1.1 gigawatts of generation capacity to the power system. That is roughly the output of a brand-new commercial reactor, achieved entirely by boosting the efficiency and hardware of current plants.

“These investments will add more reliable baseload power to the grid, help lower electricity costs, strengthen our nation’s energy security, and fuel long-term American prosperity,” said EDF Director Gregory A. Beard.

The expansion comes as the tech sector races to secure dependable power for massive data centers. Running advanced artificial intelligence models requires continuous, baseload electricity. 

While wind and solar farms are expanding rapidly, their output fluctuates with the weather. Nuclear reactors, by contrast, run day and night without emitting carbon during generation.

1 gigawatts to deliver enough power for more than 930,000 households. The initiative is also forecast to create more than 10,000 engineering and construction jobs. The electricity will feed directly into two major regional networks. These are the PJM Interconnection in the east and the Midcontinent Independent System Operator across the central United States.

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