US reactor company ‘exploring strategic partnerships’ to deploy clean energy at scale for data centre boom
OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman is stepping down as chair of advanced nuclear reactor developer Oklo to avoid a conflict of interest ahead of talks between his company and the nuclear startup on an energy supply agreement.
Altman, who was an early-stage investor in US-based Oklo, will step down immediately and be replaced by Jacob DeWitte, the group’s chief executive officer and co-founder.
The move gives Oklo more flexibility to potentially explore partnerships with OpenAI or other cloud service providers amid data centre companies’ push to secure power.
“We are excited to continue working with him [Sam Altman] to bring scalable, clean energy to the AI sector and beyond, and to continue to explore strategic partnerships with leading AI companies, including potentially with OpenAI,” Caroline Cochran, Oklo’s co-founder and chief operating officer, said in a statement.
Altman said: “As Oklo explores strategic partnerships to deploy clean energy at scale, particularly to enable the deployment of AI, I believe now is the right time for me to step down.”
In November Oklo said it was partnering with two major data centre providers to deliver up to 750 MW of nuclear power for data centres across the US. It gave no further details of those agreements. In December, Oklo signed an agreement to provide up to 12 GW of power for data centre company Switch.
Second Attempt Underway To Secure Federal Licence
In March Oklo said it was preparing for its second attempt at securing a federal licence for a small modular reactor after being denied by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) three years ago.
The NRC said at the time that the denial was based on Oklo’s failure to provide information on several key topics for its Aurora nuclear power plant design. It said the company was free to submit a complete application in the future.
Oklo’s Aurora nuclear plant consists of a small fast neutron fission reactor with integrated solar panels. The company says Aurora has a smaller and simpler design than many other small reactors that will range from 75 MW to as much as 100 MW or more. Oklo plans to build and operate the plants, directly selling power to customers under long-term contracts.
Oklo is aiming to deploy its first Aurora plant at Idaho National Laboratory in Idaho Falls before the end of the decade.
Fast neutron reactors offer the prospect of vastly more efficient use of uranium resources and the ability to burn actinides, which are otherwise the long-lived component of high-level nuclear waste. They can extract more energy from uranium, use less mined uranium and convert unused uranium into new fuel.
