Tech corporations could also be vocal about their love of superior nuclear energy — the flashy pattern that’s been sweeping the vitality sector — however they proceed so as to add renewable capability.
Meta lately signed a take care of Spanish renewable developer Zelestra for 595 megawatts of solar energy in Texas, simply two weeks after signing a separate photo voltaic take care of utility firm Engie. It’s a major buy for the tech firm, representing an almost 5% bump to the 12-plus gigawatts of renewable capability it presently has below contract.
The announcement comes as Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg maintains the corporate’s formidable AI technique — which would require hefty capital investments in knowledge facilities.
Meta is racing to make its open supply Llama 4 mannequin a rival to closed-source opponents like OpenAI and Anthropic. And whereas DeepSeek confirmed that fashions might be developed extra effectively, its strategy doesn’t essentially apply to modern fashions like Llama 4.
Meta plans to spend $60 billion this yr on capital investments, most of which might go towards knowledge heart infrastructure, calling it a “strategic benefit” for the corporate, Zuckerberg stated throughout a Wednesday earnings name.
Like lots of its friends, Meta is betting that nuclear reactors can present secure energy for its future compute wants, soliciting proposals for 1 to 4 gigawatts of capability to return on-line within the early 2030s. One gigawatt is sufficient to energy about 750,000 houses.
But the corporate can’t wait till then so as to add to its knowledge heart footprint. Meta and others are deploying huge sums of capital to construct knowledge facilities, which want correspondingly massive quantities of energy. The chokepoint has some consultants predicting that half of all new AI knowledge facilities shall be underpowered by 2027.
Nuclear energy vegetation take years to construct, and the newest crop of superior reactors have but to be commercially confirmed. Natural gasoline energy vegetation are barely quicker.
Neither can compete with the velocity of renewable deployment.
A photo voltaic farm could be introduced on-line in as few as 18 months, and since the know-how is modular, parts of the facility plant can begin delivering energy earlier than the final panel is related.
That velocity has allowed renewables like wind, photo voltaic, and grid-scale battery storage to proceed racking up new contracts from tech corporations. In addition to this week’s deal, Meta introduced earlier this month it purchased 200 megawatts of photo voltaic from Engie, which is able to come on-line later this yr. Elsewhere, Microsoft helps to deploy $9 billion value of renewables with Acadia Infrastructure Capital, whereas Google is anchoring a $20 billion renewable fund with Intersect Power and TPG Rise.
