How Big Tech Hopes to Win Over Data Center Skeptics

**SPEAKER_1** (0:00)
This podcast is sponsored by Comcast Business.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:03)
So CIO's role has evolved, and they're moving from being a technologist to being the bridge between AI capabilities and human adoption.

**SPEAKER_1** (0:13)
That's Amit Verma, CTO at Comcast Business. He believes that continuous intelligence and operating posture linking people, applications, data, and machines is essential for AI at scale. Later, learn why it requires strong executive leadership.

**Belle Lin** (0:34)
Welcome to Tech News Briefing. It's Friday, August 21st. I'm Belle Lin, a reporter for the Wall Street Journal Leadership Institute. As tech companies grapple with how to generate enough power to supply their AI ambitions, nuclear energy has emerged as a clean 24-7 option that seemingly fits the bill. We're taking a look at the race to build America's first nuclear reactor in a generation. Then Big Tech is dealing with another AI issue, how to gain public support for the data centers they need to power the technology. We take you inside their public relations crusade to turn around public sentiment.
But first, AI mania may be relatively new, but the need to power AI data centers has some looking to an old power source, nuclear. But it's no simple matter to stand up a nuclear reactor, even with all the funding going into the space. WSJ reporter Jennifer Hiller joins us now to explain the newest innovations in nuclear, and the risks of a new hype cycle.
Jennifer, when we talk about nuclear, we usually think of these big conventional nuclear power plants. But how is a small modular reactor different from those big conventional ones?

**Jennifer Hiller** (1:55)
In some cases, they are a very similar design, but just scaled down and not putting out as many megawatts. In other cases, it might be new fuels, maybe different cooling. So sometimes the design is quite different. But I mean, essentially, it is just smaller. And the idea is if you make a nuclear project smaller, you can maybe better control costs, you can build the entire reactor or most of the sort of things that go into the reactor in a factory and control that manufacturing process and do a lot of them in a row and try to drive costs down that way.

**Belle Lin** (2:37)
Is it fair to say that much of the innovation coming out of these startups and new companies is around these small modular reactors?

**Jennifer Hiller** (2:46)
Yeah, definitely. This is really what is so far finding success. In the market, it's really hard to figure out how to build and mostly finance a large nuclear project. But if you were talking about projects that might be a few billion dollars or less, that's something that a lot of companies can wrap their heads around. And it's the kind of capital risk that the market understands in a better way. So we have seen some companies start construction on them. So in the next handful of years, we will start to see them come on line and be completed.

**Belle Lin** (3:24)
What are some of the biggest hurdles to getting a small modular reactor on line?

**Jennifer Hiller** (3:29)
Well, I think that's probably what we're about to find out now that projects are starting construction. We are going to find out basically how difficult they are to build and operate and to build a lot of them and operate a lot of them. That's kind of one of the things that we don't know about this part of the sector. People have now a chance to develop these reactors and to get first projects in the ground and get started in this industry.
But what we don't know is who can really make companies and have a long-term company emerge out of this. Because to have a real business, you're going to have to keep building reactors, one after the next after the next, and have a large order book where you can really start delivering a lot of these.

**Belle Lin** (4:17)
All of this talk about AI and financing also makes me think about these questions of whether a lot of this AI infrastructure is a bubble that we're in, and there's just a lot of hype happening around it. Are there concerns that there's a bubble around nuclear investment that's growing?

**Jennifer Hiller** (4:34)
Yeah, I think there is a lot of concern about that. And I think even people within the industry would say it's a bit of a hype cycle. To some extent, a lot of the power industry is riding the enthusiasm around AI, and so that can be a little bit of a roller coaster.

**Belle Lin** (4:55)
And last question for you, Jennifer, what about the large conventional reactors that we talked about at the beginning? Are those still being developed as well?