Who Is Investing in Nuclear Power for AI Data Centers?

Nuclear power is having a comeback, and AI is the reason. Data centers that train and run AI models need enormous, round-the-clock electricity. So the biggest names in tech are funding nuclear reactors to get it. This guide follows the money and shows exactly who is investing in nuclear for AI, from billionaire founders to the cloud giants signing the checks. Where stocks come up, treat this as a map of the players, not investment advice.

• Short answer: who is funding it
• The billionaire founders
• The Big Tech power deals
• The venture and public money
• The skeptic's read

Short answer: who is funding it

Two groups are funding nuclear for AI: tech billionaires who founded reactor startups, and the giant cloud companies that need the power. The billionaires supply early capital and hype. The cloud companies supply the demand by signing long-term deals to buy the electricity.

On the founder side, Sam Altman of OpenAI backed the reactor startup Oklo, and Bill Gates founded TerraPower. On the buyer side, the four largest cloud providers have all made moves. Microsoft, Amazon, Google, and Meta have each signed nuclear deals or launched hunts for reactor power.

Behind them sits a third layer: venture funds, stock-market investors, and the U.S. Department of Energy, which hands out loans, awards, and subsidies. Even chipmaker Nvidia, which sells the hardware inside AI data centers, has put money into a reactor startup. So the same companies profiting from the AI boom are helping fund the power to keep it running. For the wider picture, see our pillar guide on nuclear data centers.

The billionaire founders

Two tech billionaires personally started or funded the reactor companies now chasing AI power: Sam Altman and Bill Gates. Their names and money helped turn small nuclear startups into stock-market stars.

Sam Altman and Oklo

Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, was an early backer of Oklo, a startup building small reactors meant to sit right next to data centers. Altman served as Oklo's chairman and co-led AltC, the blank-check company (SPAC) that took Oklo public in 2024. A June 2024 filing put his stake at about 2.6 percent.

In April 2025, Altman stepped down as Oklo's chairman. The reason was a conflict of interest. OpenAI is a giant future buyer of electricity, and Altman leaving the chair freed Oklo to negotiate supply deals with OpenAI and other AI companies. His early bet also made others rich. The husband-and-wife founders of Oklo became billionaires on paper in 2025 as the stock climbed on AI excitement. To go deeper, read our explainer on what Oklo is.

Bill Gates and TerraPower

Bill Gates founded and helps fund TerraPower, which is building an advanced reactor called Natrium in Kemmerer, Wyoming. In June 2025, Gates and the venture arm of chipmaker Nvidia announced $650 million in new funding, pushing TerraPower's private financing past $1.4 billion. Add roughly $2 billion in federal cost-share support, and the project has more than $3.4 billion behind it.

The reactor cleared a major bar in early 2026. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission issued a construction permit in March 2026, and construction began in April 2026. TerraPower's timeline shows why these bets are long: the plant broke ground years after Gates first funded the idea.

The Big Tech power deals

The four largest cloud companies are the real engine of nuclear demand, and each has signed a landmark deal. They are not building reactors themselves. They are agreeing to buy the power, which gives developers the guaranteed revenue needed to fund construction.

Microsoft and Three Mile Island

In September 2024, Microsoft signed a 20-year power purchase agreement with Constellation Energy to restart Three Mile Island Unit 1. Constellation, which owns the site, renamed it the Crane Clean Energy Center. The restart is expected to cost about $1.6 billion and come online around 2028, pending regulatory approval. It is the same Pennsylvania site famous for a partial meltdown at a different unit in 1979.

Amazon, Talen, and X-energy

Amazon has moved on two fronts. In October 2024, it committed more than $500 million to reactor developer X-energy and pledged to support up to 5 gigawatts of its reactor capacity by 2039. Amazon also expanded a deal with Talen Energy in June 2025 to draw up to 1,920 megawatts from the Susquehanna nuclear plant through 2042, tied to a roughly $20 billion data-center investment in Pennsylvania. Back in 2024, Amazon had already bought a data-center campus sitting next to that same plant. The pattern is clear: park the servers beside an existing reactor and tap its power directly.

Google and Kairos Power

In October 2024, Google agreed to buy 500 megawatts of power from Kairos Power, a startup building molten-salt-cooled small reactors. Kairos aims to deliver its first reactor around 2030 and add more through 2035. Google called it the first corporate deal for multiple units of a single advanced reactor design in the United States.

Meta's nuclear hunt

Meta entered the race in December 2024 with a request for proposals seeking 1 to 4 gigawatts of new nuclear generation for its data centers. In January 2026, Meta agreed to fund two of TerraPower's Natrium reactors and take rights to power from several more. Taken together, these four companies show a shift. A few years ago, tech firms bought wind and solar credits. Now they are chasing steady, always-on nuclear power to feed AI, because data centers run day and night. For the list of developers landing these contracts, see nuclear companies powering AI.

The venture and public money

Beyond billionaires and cloud giants, the sector runs on stock-market cash and government support. This is where ordinary investors and taxpayers enter the story, often without realizing it. The money arrives through SPACs, IPOs, federal loans, and subsidies.

SPACs and IPOs

Many reactor startups skipped the slow path and went public fast. Oklo merged with a SPAC in 2024 to list its shares. In October 2025, Amazon-backed X-energy filed for a roughly $1 billion IPO. That same month, Fermi America, co-founded by former Energy Secretary Rick Perry, went public near a $19 billion valuation while reporting essentially no revenue. Fermi plans a huge nuclear, gas, and solar complex in the Texas Panhandle next to the Department of Energy's Pantex site.

Government loans, awards, and subsidies

The federal government is a quiet co-investor. The Department of Energy has offered cost-share support, such as up to about $2 billion for TerraPower's Natrium project, and it has cleared safety reviews and fuel awards for Oklo's Aurora powerhouse in Idaho. The 2022 Inflation Reduction Act also added tax credits for nuclear power, and a broader federal push in 2025 and 2026 aimed to speed reactor permits. In short, public money lowers the risk for private backers, and taxpayers help absorb the early cost of technology that has not yet proven it can deliver at scale.

To understand why these projects need so much cash, read our breakdown of how much a small modular reactor costs.

The skeptic's read

The honest read is that nuclear-for-AI mixes real engineering with heavy hype and clear conflicts of interest. The reactors may work, but the money and the promises deserve scrutiny. Here is what a skeptic watches.

Conflicts of interest

Look at Sam Altman. He chaired Oklo, a company selling reactor power, while running OpenAI, one of the largest future buyers of that power. He stepped down as chairman in April 2025 precisely because that setup was a conflict. When the same people sit on both the selling and buying sides, promises about demand can inflate a startup's value.

Hype versus delivery

Many of these companies have splashy deals but no working reactor. Oklo remains pre-revenue and does not expect to run its first plant until late 2027 at the earliest. Fermi America reached a multibillion-dollar valuation with no revenue. Building nuclear plants is slow, and timelines routinely slip by years. A signed "agreement" is not the same as electricity on the grid.

Who bears the risk

If reactors are delayed or over budget, who pays? Often it is public money and everyday shareholders, not just the billionaires. Nuclear stocks like Oklo and NuScale Power soared in 2025 on AI excitement, then fell sharply in the first half of 2026, dropping well below their highs. That swing shows how fragile a story built on future promises can be. There is a grid risk too. If tech giants lock up existing reactors for their data centers, ordinary customers may be pushed onto costlier or dirtier power, and some analysts warn everyday electricity bills could rise as a result.

A note on investing: this article explains who is funding nuclear for AI and where the conflicts lie. It is not investment advice, and it does not recommend buying or selling any stock. Ban the Bots does not give financial advice.

Want to see where these reactors and data centers are planned? Explore our data center map, learn about the growing AI backlash, and find ways of fighting back.