Layer 1 · Where the power comes from
Nuclear PPA (existing plants)
Operators large enough to sign a multi-year offtake. Amazon (Susquehanna, 1.92 GW), Microsoft (Three Mile Island restart) and Meta (Vistra) have all done exactly this.
The shape of it
- Lead time
- 1-3 years to contract; the plant already exists
- Capital cost
- None — it is a contract, not a build
- Carbon
- Effectively zero operational carbon
- Maturity
- proven
Verified 2026-09-09.
The catch
There is a fixed supply of existing reactors and the good ones are being contracted now. This is a land-grab with a finite end, not a repeatable strategy.
What it actually decides
The fastest route to large, firm, carbon-free power that exists today — precisely because you are buying something already built.
What this is powering
A GB200 NVL72 rack draws 120–132 kW and a GB300 pushes 135–200 kW, against a 2026 average rack of about 27 kW. The silicon decision and the power decision are the same decision, made eighteen months apart.
Layer 2 — Silicon · GB200 NVL72 · The 150 W inference option
Weighed against
- Nuclear PPA (existing plants) vs On-site natural gas turbines — Clean and slow against fast and dirty. The defining 2026 trade, and most operators are quietly choosing gas.
- Enhanced geothermal vs Nuclear PPA (existing plants) — The two clean firm options. One is geology-limited, the other supply-limited.
Others in where the power comes from
- Grid interconnection — 4-5 years typical, approaching 5 on average
- Small modular reactors (SMR) — 2030s for meaningful capacity
- On-site natural gas turbines — 12-24 months, the fastest firm power available
- Behind-the-meter generation — Depends on the generation, but it skips the queue
- Solar + battery storage — 18-36 months
- Wind PPA — 24-48 months
Sources
Want this whole layer as one table?
The power and cooling options on these pages as a single CSV — lead time, capex, carbon, maturity, density supported, PUE, the catch and what each one decides — ready to sort, filter or load into a notebook.
Get the energy table — free for research and evaluation
Four short lines and the download starts at once (CC-BY-NC-4.0, built from these pages the moment you ask). What you type is used only to answer the request and is never sold. Prefer Hugging Face? Request it there.
Using it inside a product, a client report or anything you sell? That needs a commercial licence.