Google’s AI Buildout Needs More Power. It Just Locked in a Massive Additional Amount.

Google has struck a long-term power agreement with Constellation Energy covering nearly 3.6 gigawatts of electricity in the PJM grid, including 890 megawatts of new nuclear capacity from upgrades to existing reactors.

The 20-year power purchase agreement will support upgrades at 11 Constellation-owned nuclear units in Illinois, Pennsylvania and New Jersey, according to a joint Google and Constellation announcement Tuesday.

The companies said the work would increase output from the existing plants without requiring new nuclear facilities. The first additional capacity is expected to come online in 2028.

Constellation plans to invest more than $4.3 billion through the agreement. The companies said the projects would sustain about 4,400 existing jobs and create roughly 7,200 construction jobs during the upgrade period.

Google also entered into a separate 15-year energy supply agreement covering another 2,700 megawatts from Constellation's existing generation fleet in PJM.

That part of the arrangement is not tied to a specific generation source and is intended to provide longer-term revenue certainty for Constellation's operating plants while keeping the power available to the broader grid.

"We're committed to meeting our growth responsibly by actively investing in clean, reliable power that brings new capacity to our nation's grids," Amanda Peterson Corio, Google's global head of energy and power, said in the company announcement.

The deal comes as Google and other major technology companies secure larger amounts of electricity for data centers and artificial intelligence workloads.

The agreement is focused on PJM Interconnection, which serves about 67 million people across 13 states and the District of Columbia.

PJM has been developing new rules for connecting large electricity users, including data centers, as demand rises across its system.

In January, the PJM Board of Managers outlined a framework that would allow large-load customers to bring new generation with them or face greater curtailment risk when grid conditions are tight.

Google and Constellation said their agreement responds to that "Bring Your Own Power" approach by adding new generation while supporting Google's electricity needs.

The 890 megawatts of new nuclear capacity will come from uprates, which involve upgrading equipment at existing reactors to increase their output.

The companies said the added capacity would be roughly equivalent to the output of a large conventional nuclear reactor.

Google has already turned to nuclear power elsewhere in its energy strategy.

The company previously reached an agreement with NextEra Energy to support the planned restart of the Duane Arnold nuclear plant in Iowa. Constellation has also signed a separate long-term agreement with Microsoft tied to the restart of Three Mile Island Unit 1 in Pennsylvania.

Constellation is the largest nuclear power operator in the U.S. and owns generation assets across nuclear, natural gas, oil, geothermal, hydro, wind and solar.

The companies are also expanding their technology partnership. Constellation will use Google Cloud and Gemini Enterprise under a new five-year agreement covering grid planning, asset monitoring and infrastructure security.

The initial work will focus on areas including site selection, power-flow modeling, permitting, outage management and operational technology security, according to the joint announcement.

The agreement also includes measures allowing Google to reduce non-critical electricity use during periods of grid stress.

The 11 nuclear units included in the planned upgrades are spread across six sites in Illinois, Pennsylvania and New Jersey, with the first additional output expected in 2028.