Maine Yankee in Wiscasset on Feb. 6, 2013. The state’s only nuclear power plant shuttered in August 1997. Gabe Souza/Portland Press Herald, file

Nuclear power is hot right now. Technology giants such as Google and Amazon are building plants to power data centers and fuel artificial intelligence. The Biden administration recently announced plans to triple nuclear capacity in the U.S. by 2050 by restarting defunct facilities and opening new plants.

Splitting the atom that produces nuclear energy doesn’t emit carbon pollution, making it attractive to states looking to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. It also provides uninterrupted power, unlike solar panels and wind turbines that require sunlight or a breeze.

But in Maine, where the sole nuclear power plant has been shuttered for nearly three decades, it’s a nonstarter – at least for now.

The word “nuclear” doesn’t even appear in the state climate plan, “Maine Can’t Wait.” Policymakers instead focus on wind and solar power, electric vehicles, heat pumps and energy conservation.

“I have not seen that same level of interest we’ve seen elsewhere,” said Dan Dolan, president of the New England Power Generators Association. “For any new facility, the level of regulatory process and siting is extraordinary. It’s hard to build anything in New England, and that one seems like an extraordinary hill to climb.”

High costs and the management of radioactive waste are also issues. Though they are rare, serious accidents at nuclear plants – like in Fukushima, Chernobyl and Three Mile Island – have killed dozens of people and environmental remediation takes years.

BIG TECH SEES NUCLEAR POTENTIAL

Across the country, several nuclear power developments, most involving Big Tech firms, were announced in just the last month.

Three Mile Island, the Pennsylvania site of the worst nuclear accident in the U.S., is set to restart as part of a deal with Microsoft. The U.S. Department of Energy is providing a $1.5 billion loan guarantee to reopen a Michigan nuclear plant. Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has helped break ground in Wyoming on a small modular reactor, the latest technology in nuclear energy.

Google and nuclear-energy startup Kairos Power announced that the search engine giant, requiring a large supply of electricity to power AI, will back the construction of seven small nuclear power reactors in the U.S. in the next decade. And online retail giant Amazon and Dominion Energy said they’re exploring ways to advance small modular reactors, or SMRs, in Virginia that would supply power for Amazon’s cloud computing unit.

The Biden administration announced on Nov. 12 that the U.S. will seek to triple nuclear capacity by 2050 with 200 gigawatts of net new nuclear energy capacity. It would be achieved by building nuclear power plants, increasing the generating power of reactors online and restarting reactors that have retired for economic reasons. The targets aim to “restore and exceed” the nuclear energy industry’s capacity decades ago, the White House said.

“It is remarkable watching what’s been happening over the last six months,” said Patrick Woodcock, president and chief executive officer of the Maine State Chamber of Commerce and a former energy official who advised Gov. Paul LePage and served as a top energy official in Massachusetts. “This is happening with the private sector that can really change the landscape … to bring economies of scale with technology. It’s going to be fascinating to watch nationally.”

‘IT’S HARD TO BUILD ANYTHING IN NEW ENGLAND’

Building data centers, which are spiking demand for nuclear power, is hindered by New England’s dense land use and high retail price of electricity, Dolan said. “I’m not seeing any major growth around those issues,” he said.

Aneesh Prabhu, managing director and sector lead of infrastructure ratings at S&P Global, said data centers need an uninterrupted supply of power and firm commitments, explaining “why you’re hearing this kind of renaissance or resurgence of nuclear.”

“It’s clean and it’s consistent,” he said.

John Goodhue, executive director of the Massachusetts Green High Performance Computing Center, a Holyoke, Massachusetts, data center serving six universities, said tech companies have “tended to focus” on regions outside New England partly because electricity is less expensive.

Data centers have established a “noticeable presence” in New England, but states in the region have not courted data centers as an industry, he said.

NO ‘SERIOUS MOVEMENT’ FOR NUCLEAR IN THE NEXT 5 YEARS

Public Advocate William Harwood, whose early work in the field of energy was as a lawyer for utilities seeking to build the Seabrook nuclear plant in New Hampshire in the 1980s, says the subject of nuclear energy comes up occasionally. “I’m asked once a month in casual conversation: ‘What about nuclear? Are there any opportunities there?’ ”

“I really don’t see any serious movement to develop nuclear in Maine in the next five years,” he said.

Part of the reason is the failure of Maine Yankee in Wiscasset, which initially was Maine’s largest generator of electricity and considered “too cheap to meter,” or so inexpensive that it was pointless to put a meter on it to gauge the cost of power it generated. “Of course, that turned out not to be right,” Harwood said.

Steel-lined concrete containers hold spent fuel assemblies at the shuttered Maine Yankee nuclear power plant in Wiscasset in February 2013. Gabe Souza/Portland Press Herald

Maine Yankee, which faced opposition from antinuclear advocates, required costly upgrades and was shut in 1997 after 25 years in operation because it was no longer cost-effective, he said. It’s owned by Central Maine Power Co.

“The Maine public really soured on nuclear,” Harwood said.

NUCLEAR NOT AN ‘ELIGIBLE TECHNOLOGY’ AMONG RENEWABLES

Afton Vigue, a spokesperson for the Governor’s Energy Office, said in an email that nuclear power is not an “eligible technology” for Maine’s renewable portfolio standard, which was approved by the Legislature and establishes the portion of electricity sold in Maine supplied by renewable energy resources. A 2019 law cites as “renewable capacity resource” a source of electrical generation that relies on fuel cells, tidal power, geothermal installations, hydroelectric and biomass generators, and anaerobic digestion of byproducts of waste from animals and agricultural crops.

Minority Republicans in the Legislature proposed a measure last year that would have directed the state Public Utilities Commission to seek “informational bids” about siting small modular reactors, also known as SMRs and advanced nuclear. The legislation failed to advance.

Rep. Reagan Paul, R-Winterport, a sponsor, said the measure only sought requests for proposals. “We’re not making any commitments here,” she told fellow legislators last spring during a review of the legislation. SMRs, which she called an “innovative technology,” operate around the clock and generate energy when solar and wind power are dormant at night and on windless days, she said.

Paul did not agree to an interview, but said in written responses to questions that demand for wind and solar in Maine “has been artificially created by the Legislature due to the massive amount of subsidies available to prop up these sources that could never compete in the free market.”

Rep. Gerry Runte, D-York, a member of the Legislature’s Energy, Utilities and Technology Committee, opposed the legislation, which he said was not intended for legislative action. “These campaigns to promote a particular technology are for investors,” he said.

Seth Berry, a former co-chairman of the committee, said pro-nuclear power advocates in the Legislature try unsuccessfully every few years to “knock the dust off” nuclear power legislation.

“There’s the realization that it’s not going anywhere,” he said. “There isn’t interest in taking on that expense.”

Jack Shapiro, climate and clean energy director at the Natural Resources Council of Maine, said the state benefits from solar and wind power resources that “don’t have the question marks that come with something like advanced nuclear.”

MOST SMALL MODULAR REACTORS STILL AT DESIGN STAGE

Runte, who earned a master’s degree in nuclear engineering, said Gates’ backing of an SMR in Kemmerer, Wyoming, is a long-term bet. “It’s not anywhere near on the horizon. It’s not known if after the dust settles you have something economic,” he said.

Gates said the plant “hopefully comes online in 2030.”

The timing “may be a little aggressive,” but construction of SMRs is not as “long-dated” as nuclear plants, said Prabhu, the managing director at S&P Global.

“Once you get the regulatory approval, you can quickly start them up,” he said.

Most SMRs, which generate 50 to 300 megawatts and are less costly to build than a nuclear plant, have yet to move beyond the design phase. Only NuScale Power Corp.’s SMR has received design certification from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, six years after it was accepted by the agency. Other developers, such as TerraPower, Westinghouse, GE-Hitachi Nuclear Energy and Holtec International, have NRC license applications in process.

As an example of the regulatory requirements involved with SMR certification, NuScale said preparing its application to the NRC cost more than $500 million and required 2 million hours of labor.

And Plant Vogtle, a 5-gigawatt, two-unit nuclear reactor in Waynesboro, Georgia, began operating this year, 15 years after the start of construction, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Originally expected to cost $14 billion and begin commercial operation in 2016, it ballooned to more than $30 billion, according to the EIA.

SUPPORT FOR NUCLEAR IN STATE LEGISLATURES

Runte said Vogtle’s cost is far greater than for offshore wind and solar power, which will become less costly over time, he said.

Christine Csizmadia, senior director of state governmental affairs and advocacy at the Nuclear Energy Institute, an industry group, said critics find fault with “all kinds of generation.” Nuclear plants are long-term investments extending 60 to 80 years, she said.

She cited nearly 20 states that have enacted legislation that supports nuclear power in some way, either with financial incentives, establishing a nuclear energy agency, tax exemptions for nuclear plants or studies.

Antinuclear advocates oppose plant reopenings and federal spending to advance small modular reactor technology.

“Everyone is subsidy-harvesting as much as they can,” said David Kraft, director of the Nuclear Energy Information Center.

SMRs, which he calls “small mythical reactors,” are speculative. Nuclear power diverts money and attention from renewable energy, battery storage, improved transmission and energy efficiency, Kraft said.

Two nuclear power plants – Seabrook Station in Seabrook, New Hampshire, and the Millstone Power Station in Waterford, Connecticut – generated 23% of New England’s power as of January, according to ISO-New England, the region’s grid operator. Two others in New England, Pilgrim Station in Plymouth, Massachusetts, and Vermont Yankee, have been closed.

Dolan said he hears “broader openness” to nuclear energy in New England, particularly if power plants elsewhere in the U.S. operate successfully.

“There is now broader state support to at least keep the two facilities viable,” he said.

Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey said in September that she has discussed with Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont the possibility of Massachusetts ratepayers purchasing a portion of the power generated by Millstone.

Harwood, Maine’s public advocate, said public opinion against nuclear power could shift if solar or offshore wind, which is the focus of ambitious state energy policy goals, falter or frequent winter storms wreak havoc on Maine’s grids.

“That electricity has to come from somewhere and we can’t keep burning gas,” he said.