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Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta plans to build a nuclear-powered AI data center in the United States have been thwarted in part because a rare species of bee was discovered on land reserved for the project, according to people familiar with the matter.
Zuckerberg had planned to strike a deal with an existing nuclear power plant operator to provide emissions-free electricity to a new data center supporting his artificial intelligence ambitions.
However, the potential deal faced multiple complications, including environmental and regulatory challenges, these sources said.
The discovery of the rare species of bees at a location next to the factory where the data center was to be built would have complicated the project, Zuckerberg said at a Meta general meeting last week, according to two people close to the meeting.
The blow comes as rivals Amazon, Google and Microsoft all recently struck deals with nuclear power plant operators to meet the growing energy demands of data centers as they strive to train and maintain power-hungry AI models. An AI query consumes up to 10 times more energy than a standard Google search.
Meta continues to explore various carbon-free energy deals, including nuclear, one of the sources said. Meta declined to comment.
Nuclear power is increasingly seen as a way to achieve stable, 24-hour power during the AI war between big tech.
However, it also has high upfront costs and takes a long time to build. Western industry has always depended on Russia for its nuclear fuel.
Critics also warn of the risks of a buildup of toxic radioactive waste, which must be stored safely or it could seriously harm both humans and the environment.
In September, Microsoft announced that it would restart the mothballed nuclear power plant at Three Mile IslandPennsylvania.
Amazon paid $650 million in March to set up a data center next to the Susquehanna Steam Electric nuclear power plant, also in Pennsylvania.
Google, meanwhile, announced last month that it had ordered six to seven small modular nuclear reactors from US start-up Kairos Power, becoming the first technology company to commission new nuclear power plants.
Zuckerberg is under pressure to prove to investors that his all-out bet on AI will pay off, as the company’s capital spending continues to rise given its investments in operating servers and data centers to develop advanced technology.
Zuckerberg told the entire staff that, if the deal had gone through, Meta would have been the first Big Tech company to use nuclear-powered AI and would have had the largest nuclear power plant available to power the centers of data, two people said.
A person familiar with the matter said Zuckerberg was frustrated by the lack of nuclear options in the United States, while China has turned to nuclear power. China appears to be building nuclear reactors at a rapid pace, while only a handful of reactors have come online in the past two decades in the United States.
Meta said it had already achieved “net zero emissions” in its operations since 2020.
Additional reporting by Malcolm Moore in London