NextEra Energy, an American energy company, may expand its nuclear capacity by as much as 9 GW to cater to its data center customers. It revealed these plans during a recent earnings call.
NextEra recently shared its fourth-quarter results, and while on a call with investors, John Ketchum, chairman, president and CEO, NextEra Energy, said, “Our plan (is) to recommission our Duane Arnold nuclear plant, which was enabled by a power purchase agreement with Google. NextEra Energy Resources also brought 7.2 gigawatts of new generation online.”
Readers would recall that plans to recommission the Duane Arnold nuclear plant, were first revealed last year, and were formalized in October 2025, when NextEra entered into a power purchase agreement (PPA) with Google. The PPA, aims to help meet growing energy demand from artificial intelligence (AI) with clean, reliable nuclear energy. Once operational, Google will purchase power from the 615-MW plant as a 24/7 carbon-free energy source to help power Google’s growing cloud and AI infrastructure in Iowa.
The U.S power grid is under unprecedented pressure in wake of the huge surge in power demand from data centers. This has prompted an increasing amount of interest in not just renewable energy sources such as solar and wind power, but also led to plans and announcements surrounding reactivation of decommissioned or closed nuclear plants.
U.S. power use is expected to hit new highs in 2026 as AI and cryptocurrency data centers expand. NextEra said it could add 6 GW of new nuclear energy at existing sites and is exploring greenfield locations for advanced nuclear power as per a report by Reuters.
Meanwhile, NextEra says it has seen interest from customers in Florida for powering nearly 20 GW of data center capacity, with nearly half in advanced discussions and potentially online by 2028.