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Meta was set to reach a deal with an operator of the existing nuclear plant to supply power to a new facility that would help achieve its AI's ambitions. However, according to people briefed on the matter, complications arose that could have stood in the way of the would-be deal. The rare discovery of a bee species has put a damper on Mark Zuckerberg's dream of an AI data center powered by emission-free nuclear energy.
At an all-hands meeting last week, Zuckerberg told employees that the discovery of the rare species of bee was at least in part responsible for the stalling of the project. The bees were found on land next to the nuclear plant that was reserved as the site for Meta's data center.
It would have been a problem to build the facility there because of environmental regulations that protect the endangered and threatened species. Because rare bees are part of the landscape, permitting the center near the reactor would have likely overcome significant regulatory hurdles.
The Financial Times wrote;
The discovery of the rare bee species on a location next to the plant where the data centre was to be built would have complicated the project, Zuckerberg told a Meta all-hands meeting last week, according to two people familiar with the meeting.
The regulators also recently denied a request from Amazon. The company had asked to increase the quantity of power it gets from the Susquehanna nuclear plant from 300 megawatts to 480 megawatts for one of its data centers. However, the government disallowed the expansion in allotment.
As technology companies invest billions in AI, their carbon footprint is increasing. Just last week, Microsoft admitted that its emissions had grown 29% since 2020, driven by AI investments. Nuclear power is unlikely to provide a full offset to this, with plants like Three Mile Island demanding sizeable premiums over alternatives like wind and solar.
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