A viewer wrote in asking about something they've been hearing a lot about lately. With all the talk about small nuclear reactors coming to Kentucky, would Lexington ever consider nuclear power as an alternative to our current energy sources?

That's actually perfect timing for that question because something pretty significant just happened this week. Louisville Gas and Electric Company and Kentucky Utilities announced Wednesday they are partnering with Maryland-based X-energy to explore bringing small modular nuclear reactors to Kentucky. Now, Kentucky Utilities is our electric company here in Lexington and Fayette County, so this could absolutely affect us directly.

Really? So this isn't just hypothetical anymore?

Not at all. The collaboration aims to deploy X-energy's Xe-100 small modular reactors to meet growing energy demand across the Commonwealth with long-term, reliable, clean energy. The companies have begun early project feasibility activities and will explore opportunities for SMR deployments to support long-term grid reliability across the Commonwealth, and large load customers, including data centers. And the timing makes sense because Governor Andy Beshear signed into law the Nuclear Reactor Site Readiness Pilot Program passed by the General Assembly, which includes a seventy-five-million dollar grant initiative to support nuclear site feasibility studies.

What would these reactors actually look like compared to what people think of when they hear nuclear power?

These are completely different from those massive traditional nuclear plants you might picture. The Xe-100 reactors have the capacity to produce eighty megawatts of electricity each unit and can be paired in four-unit or twelve-unit power plants. They're scaled down in size compared to larger, traditional nuclear power plants. Such reactors can be factory-built and transported to a location to serve electricity load. So we're talking about something much more flexible and manageable than the old model.

Is there any sense of timeline on when we might actually see something like this?

Right now they're still in the early feasibility phase, but the state is clearly moving fast on this. Kentucky lawmakers this year established a grant program that would allow a state nuclear energy authority to provide grants, up to twenty-five million dollars each, to subsidize the costs of seeking federal licenses and permits to locate nuclear power plants in the state. The infrastructure is there, the regulatory framework is getting built out, and our utility company is actively exploring it. So while I can't give you an exact date, this feels like something that's actually going to happen, not just something they're studying forever.

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