The Missouri Nuclear Summit's data center projects are not guaranteed, experts say experts say

Missouri, USA – Missouri residents will probably pay the massive costs for the upcoming nuclear energy expansion of the state, and the officials across the country listed why.

Numerous national and state supporters for nuclear energy were elected to the Missouri theater from Columbia in the Missouri theater in Columbia after the state was selected as one of seven countries to hold a national nuclear summit. The aim of the summit was to ignite the conversation for new nuclear energy projects throughout the state and was powered by the National Governors Association and the Department of Energy.

Previous reporting: Missouri and her bank account are about to go nuclear

Almost every spokesman on the summit shared the same reason why Missouri now has to expand nuclear system: large data centers are forecast to threaten the nation's energy network. However, critics say that this is speculation, and there is no guarantee that large technology companies Missouri will choose to set up.

Missouri already has a nuclear power plant in Callaway County that has been working for over 40 years. Doug True, Senior Vice President and Chief Nuclear Officer at the Atomin Energy Institute said that more is necessary because the national electricity requirements are expected to address if the nation moves into the era of artificial secret services.

“If you ask a Ki chat bot to show you a picture of your dog that drives a car, it takes about the 1,000 times more energy (than a Google search), and it is enough energy to hold a stop for 20 minutes,” said True. “Now you think of everyone who goes to chat and just play around. Every time you do that, you need so much energy.”

In a recent report by the Ministry of Energy, it states that the growth of the AI calculation centers must be corresponded to the growth of the national energy network. In a separate report by the International Energy Agency, the AI calculation centers were expected to be more than twice twice as much worldwide by 2030. True, other projections showed that the electricity requirement has been largely stable in the past ten years.

Missouri has already heard the rumbling of new data centers. A large -scale data center in St. Charles recently received a partial approval of local officials. The potential of more data centers in Missouri was also indicated by Joe Alexander, the head of the department of department, who said that he had been approached by representatives of a company that Alexander had not identified that he said, interest in building an AI data center in Columbia.

While the national forecasts for the energy requirement of the exam are increasing, energy experts at 5 said on their side that state forecasts become much more speculative.

Holding back specific information from the public about data centers is common, as Alexander did with the AI company, which is supposedly interested in Columbia.

Ameren Missouri has also reduced information about two supposed data centers that come to Missouri to build a methane -tap plant south of St. Louis. Officials who were involved with the possible data center of St. Charles refused to publish the company's name that operates him.

Read more: The secret and massive 'Project Cumulus' data center receives a partial approval of St. Charles Planning and Zoning Commission

The confidentiality is partly due to the fact that the interested company can select its data center until another state has been set up.

Missouri has already lost several projects from the data center, said Subash alias, CEO of Missouri Partnership, on the summit.

“(Data center) companies do not want to choose Missouri, they want to remove Missouri,” said alias. “These companies quickly eliminate regions and states based on certain factors. If you have what you are looking for, it does not mean that you will progress. It only means that you are not eliminated.”

Missouri officials often know that the state cannot serve the requirements of the data centers, but they still pursue the contracts, hoping that other countries fail and, according to alias, excluding the consideration. He also said that the state is trying not to reduce the companies to extend the deadlines.

Alias accused the current lack of nuclear generation of the state as the reason why these centers were lost, but other experts referred to incentives that have other states for data centers that are missing in Missouri.

“It is convinced that” if we build it, they will come “, but there are many other states with incentives for data centers that Missouri does not have,” said James Owen, Executive Director of Reneuri, compared to 5 on their side. “There is absolutely no guarantee that this will happen.”

There is also no clarity about which guardrails, if at all, can set up legislators in Missouri to stop that the “carpet will be” by Missouri Utilities, Research Associate Jonathan Kim, from Research Associate Jonathan Kim von Missouri, Energy and Political Institute. This means that if data centers say that they are building up in Missouri, but in the end after the supply companies have already built numerous power plants, the state's interest payers will be on the hook to pay for energy that is nowhere.

“The greatest risk here and something that has not caused sufficient caution is the risk of building a new generation for this new energy stress, and the load that does not appear,” said Kim. “If that happens, it is all existing wage payers who take the bill for something they didn't need and are godless.”

There is another option that was not discussed on the summit and is equipped with its own problems.

Numerous data centers are built by technology companies across the country of several billion dollars, and they decide more often to build their own energy generation on site instead of relying on the power grid of a state.

Meta, parent company of Facebook and Instagram, plans to build their own nuclear power advertisers for its data centers in Illinois. Data centers in Texas build their own gas power plants. The proposed data center of St. Charles has also built up its own power generator on site, although the details remain dark.

The advantages of electricity generators of the data center include losing off trunks from the states of the states and maintaining power plant costs in front of the residents of the state.

One disadvantage is that power plants that have been built by and for large technology companies ranks or even converted state regulations, as well as additional infrastructure and additional headaches for the residents of the nearby residents.

“There are standard rules about how the maintenance and upgrade costs are divided and assigned. However, the situation is completely changed by the presence of a new data center,” said. “As a result, the supply companies now have to rethink their traditional tariff structures so as not to burden the residents excessively in order to pay the infrastructure changes required for the HOST data centers.”