Blue Energy raises $380 million to build grid-scale nuclear reactors at shipyards

As the grid strains under the weight of data centers, electricity, and artificial intelligence, Technology companies Utilities are evaluating whether nuclear power could help ease the burden. After the two most recent reactors built in the United States went over budget and the previous schedule, they are not eager to repeat the past.

But Jake Gurewitch, co-founder and CEO of startup Blue Energy, believes the answer to faster and cheaper construction can actually be found in the industry’s early history.

Blue energy You want to build nuclear reactors in shipyards because these sites can handle large amounts of steel and can be easily shipped to the project site once it is completed.

“The most common nuclear power technology — light water reactors — was originally invented for nuclear submarines,” Gurewitch told TechCrunch. “There has always been a history of prefabrication of it and looking at it in a shipyard context.”

To begin development of its first power plant — a 1.5 gigawatt project scheduled to begin construction later this year in Texas — Blue Energy has raised $380 million in financing split between equity and debt. The round was led by VXI Capital, with participation from At One Ventures, Engine Ventures, and Tamarack Global.

Unlike many nuclear startups, Blue Energy is not designing a new reactor, instead it is rethinking how reactors and power plants are built. Jurewicz was inspired by the process used by Venture Global to build LNG export terminals. A friend of his works at the company, and when Gourevitch heard more about its approach to building LNG projects, he said he was “really impressed.”

“They cut the timeline in half to do it, which was very annoying,” he said.

By moving the bulk of specialized construction to the shipyard, Blue Energy hopes the more controlled environment will eventually pave the way toward automation and further cost savings.

“It really reduces the amount of on-site construction, moving almost everything into the manufacturing environment. After you centralize all that work, you can start to move away from manual welding,” he said.

Once the reactor and other parts are built at the shipyard, the company plans to transport them to the installation site via barge. Although this limits the total number of sites Blue Energy can process, the company can still use rivers to reach deep into the United States, Europe, Africa and Asia.

“The majority of our population and the majority of our load growth is happening around waterways,” Gourevitch said.

Blue Energy says its approach is attracting interest from project financiers.

“We have been engaged for a long time with a number of large infrastructure funds and banks, including three major project finance banks who responded to our RFP, which is a strong indication that they feel what we are proposing is a bankable project,” he said.

Gourevitch added that the key to this financing is the company’s plan to reduce construction costs, which have risen dramatically for nuclear power in recent decades.

“That’s the crux of the problem with nuclear power,” he said. “It’s not the technology, it’s how we can reduce the construction costs and the construction schedule and get to a predictable place.”