This article first appeared on the Magnolia Tribune.
- “Economic development in the future is going to go to places where you have affordable and reliable power,” PSC Commissioner De’Keither Stamps said.
With billions of dollars in economic development projects coming to Mississippi, including multiple data centers, reliable and affordable energy is needed to power these new facilities as they require substantial amounts of electricity.
According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (USEIA), natural gas accounted for 76 percent of Mississippi’s electricity net generation in 2023 and was the primary fuel used at nine of the state’s ten largest power plants.
However, to meet the demands of the future, one energy source state officials are exploring is nuclear power.
Governor Tate Reeves (R) has shown an openness to support nuclear power during his announcements of these large-scale projects, saying he supports all energy sources if they are safe, reliable, and affordable.
In May, Reeves went further, noting during his Power Play Summit that “the future is going to be nuclear,” a sign of state-level support for nuclear power development in some capacity.
Last year, the Mississippi Public Service Commission also threw its support behind nuclear power. The three-member commission passed a resolution stating the PCS recognizes nuclear power as “a clean baseload energy necessary to achieve a reliable, secure, and diversified electric grid.”
Chris Brown (R), the Northern District PSC Commissioner and the group’s chairman, said three major benefits of nuclear power are resiliency, reliability, and affordability. The PSC oversees a wide range of public utility regulation, including power generation.
State officials have said Mississippi is open to expanding its current nuclear power generation, which currently sits at one facility, Entergy’s Grand Gulf Nuclear Station near Port Gibson.
The USEIA reports that the 1,400-megawatt Grand Gulf Nuclear Power Station is the largest single-reactor nuclear power plant by net summer generating capacity in the nation. The plant generated about 16 percent of the state’s electricity in 2023.
Commissioner Brown believes being open to more nuclear power generation shows the world “Mississippi is open for business.” In November, Brown went further, telling the Senate Energy Committee, “We think nuclear is our future.”
Last fall, at an PSC-sponsored Nuclear Summit, Central District Commissioner De’Keither Stamps (D) said nuclear energy is linked to Mississippi’s economic development.
“Economic development in the future is going to go to places where you have affordable and reliable power,” Stamps said. “And one of the most affordable and reliable power sources is nuclear.”
With Mississippi already having three data centers under construction, AWS, AVAIO and Compass, Brown said nuclear power will make the Magnolia State more attractive to similar industries.
“Securing the power connection is typically the biggest hurdle for a data center,” an AVAIO spokesperson said.
Data centers and the rise of AI-powered tools have created unprecedented demand for computing power, wrote Robert Rapier in Forbes earlier this year.
“These complex models require massive amounts of electricity not just during training, but continuously during deployment (or inference) as well,” Rapier wrote. “This isn’t just about a few extra servers. AI data centers are power-hungry operations, often requiring the energy equivalent of a small city. Some estimates suggest that U.S. data centers could consume more electricity by 2030 than entire countries such as Japan or Turkey.”
Rapier notes that electric utilities from Texas to Virginia are scrambling to adapt to this new energy strain on the grid.
“The challenges are both technical and political. Meeting these new demands often requires massive upgrades to transmission infrastructure—projects that can take five to ten years to permit and build. Meanwhile, delays frustrate developers and risk driving AI firms to seek power from independent suppliers or alternative locations,” Rapier wrote. “Utility companies are being forced to rethink everything: where and how they build generation, how they plan grid expansions, and how to regulate and forecast demand. The traditional demand modeling tools that rely on historical trends are no longer sufficient in this brave new world.”
There has been speculation about another nuclear facility in Mississippi to help with energy generation in this new tech environment, particularly in Tishomingo County’s Yellow Creek. For half a decade, Huntsville, Alabama-based Flibe Energy has spent more than $250 million on site improvements. Yet, it remains unclear when and if the site would receive approval from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Flibe’s Chief Executive Officer Kirk Sorensen was in attendance at the state’s Power Play Summit. Mississippi’s willingness to further explore nuclear power and its proactive attitude are positive signs for the state, the CEO said.
“This aligns perfectly with our vision for Mississippi’s energy landscape, where our Yellow Creek operations could play a critical role in regional energy security,” Sorenson said.
In 1978, the Tennessee Valley Authority started construction on the Yellow Creek nuclear power plant but abandoned its work in 1983. The TVA abandoned the project in 1984 due to cost and lower electrical demands, according to the New York Times.
Sorenson emphasized to Governor Reeves how rising uranium costs – a vital material in nuclear reactors – threaten conventional nuclear economics, while Flibe’s thorium-based Lithium Fluoride Thorium Reactor technology offers a promising alternative with significantly lower fuel and construction expenses.
“Flibe Energy remains committed to working alongside Mississippi stakeholders to advance thorium energy as a safe, affordable, and sustainable power solution for the region,” Sorenson said.
President Donald Trump (R) called for 10 nuclear power facilities to be built by 2030 in a recent executive order, with accelerated licensing timelines, construction of reactors for the U.S. Department of Energy and U.S. Department of Defense use, and support for nuclear fuel cycle infrastructure.
Mississippi officials are not sure if the state will see a nuclear power plant approved by way of the executive orders, but they are hopeful.
“Mississippi can make it happen,” said Commissioner Brown, adding that a nuclear reactor has not been built in four decades.
If Mississippi does gain more nuclear facilities, the commissioner said he would like to see institutions of higher learning offer courses in nuclear facility management. Currently, many nuclear reactor employees are at or near retirement age, and the younger generation is not gravitating towards the industry.
This article first appeared on the Magnolia Tribune and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
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