The Nuclear Company (TNC) announced on Friday evening a strategic partnership with US steel producer Nucor (NUE.US), aimed at significantly boosting America's nuclear energy and nuclear power system supply chain, and supporting domestic manufacturing and the nearly limitless electricity resources required for AI training and inference systems through an expanded nuclear power system.

TNC stated in a release that the strategic cooperation agreement focuses on evaluating steel materials and related manufacturing processes that meet American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) NQA-1 certification standards required for nuclear-grade components. The Nuclear Company said that by partnering with Nucor, one of America's largest steel companies by capacity, the goal is to secure reliable domestic steel supply for increasingly large nuclear energy projects, further strengthen America's clean energy independence, and advance the Trump administration's "Made in America" manufacturing reshoring and reinvestment strategy.

Nucor stated that this deal aligns with its broader strategy of supporting US energy infrastructure modernization and positioning itself as a key participant in America's nuclear energy and power system renaissance. TNC noted in its statement that this collaboration will support President Trump's previous executive order to achieve 400 gigawatts of nuclear power capacity by 2050, including the construction of 10 large-scale nuclear reactors over the next five years.

This partnership between TNC and Nucor essentially establishes and strengthens the "manufacturing and quality foundation" for America's nuclear power system renaissance: using domestic, certifiable, and replicable nuclear-grade steel and manufacturing systems to unlock supply chains for large reactor upgrades and SMR expansion, compress uncertainties, and reduce capital costs.

For AI and cloud computing giants like OpenAI, Meta, and Microsoft, which are "investing heavily in nuclear power," this doesn't directly translate to new nuclear units, but it is a necessary prerequisite for achieving long-term, stable, hourly zero-carbon power delivery to their nuclear power portfolios.

**AI's Ultimate Need is Electricity! Nuclear Power Demand Most Popular Among Power Sources**

The unprecedented large-scale data center construction and expansion boom is pushing US grid power demand to levels unseen in 20 years. A recent forecast from PJM Interconnection shows that over the next 15 years (through 2035), summer peak load could increase by 70 gigawatts, reaching 220 gigawatts. This would be 32% higher than the unprecedented historical peak of approximately 165.6 gigawatts set in summer 2006, and significantly exceed the current installed capacity of 183 gigawatts.

High-energy-consumption AI data centers, expanding exponentially due to fierce demand for AI chips and other computing infrastructure, rely fundamentally on power supply as their core infrastructure, which is the origin of the market view that "AI's ultimate need is electricity."

A forecast from the International Energy Agency (IEA) shows that by 2030, global data center electricity demand will more than double, reaching approximately 945 terawatt-hours (TWh), slightly higher than Japan's current total electricity consumption. Artificial intelligence applications will be the most important driver of this growth, with AI-focused data centers' overall electricity demand expected to increase more than fourfold by 2030.

Under the current and long-term global decarbonization trend, nuclear energy, as an efficient and stable clean energy source, has become the most favored energy choice for tech giants like Amazon, Google, and Microsoft in recent years. This energy source, combining clean, stable, and efficient attributes, promises to provide 24-hour uninterrupted powerful electricity support for their massive data centers.

Therefore, global politicians and tech companies currently support nuclear energy and nuclear power plants more strongly than at any time since the 1970s. Most notably, the US government has completely transformed its attitude toward nuclear reactors, especially with Trump's return to the White House and his major push for America's nuclear power renaissance.

President Trump previously signed four executive orders to promote US nuclear industry innovation, including expanding America's nuclear energy scale, nuclear industry chain, and shortening nuclear project approval cycles. This move may sound the horn for America's nuclear power renaissance.

Driven by the positive impact of Trump's multiple "nuclear renaissance orders," this explains why US market stocks like OKLO and global nuclear energy-related stocks have continued to surge since Trump's major push for the nuclear industry.

**Key Points and Market Impact of Nucor-TNC Strategic Cooperation**

Nucor is one of America's largest steel companies by capacity, following the typical electric arc furnace (EAF) route, using recycled scrap steel as primary material. Its products cover thick plates, structural steel, long products, pipeline steel, and in recent years has expanded into higher-specification steel for nuclear power, offshore wind, and energy infrastructure.

The Nuclear Company (TNC) is a new nuclear energy platform company focused on rebuilding America's nuclear supply chain and project delivery (positioned as "industrial integration/engineering management + supply chain").

This partnership emphasizes validating steel materials and manufacturing processes according to ASME NQA-1 systems (nuclear-grade quality assurance) to serve future nuclear projects (including new construction, technical upgrades, and decommissioning replacement parts).

For nuclear power generation systems, this strategic cooperation undoubtedly aims to strengthen nuclear-grade steel and heavy components. The goal is to establish material genealogy, batch traceability, non-destructive examination (NDE), low-temperature impact/fracture toughness, welding procedure qualification (PQR/WPS), and other key indicators domestically in the US, shortening delivery times, reducing import dependence, and lowering costs while controlling schedules—transforming "long order cycles" into "plannable cycles."

Another key point is paving the way for SMR scaling—most small modular reactors (SMRs) depend less on super-large components than traditional large reactors but still require nuclear-grade materials and stable capacity for modular manufacturing. Domestic compliant steel + replicable processes = facilitating standardization and batch production, which is a necessary condition for moving SMRs from "demonstration" to "scale."

AI training and inference systems drive data centers with high density and long-term full load operations, requiring extremely high availability and power quality standards. Localizing the nuclear power supply chain improves equipment delivery reliability and grid connection schedule certainty, making it easier to align data center expansion schedules with power source commissioning timelines, supporting tech giants' AI data center power consumption surge.

Therefore, Nucor's partnership with TNC means more implementable 24/7 zero-carbon power contracts (CFE) for US tech giants who have recently made "heavy investments in nuclear power" (especially in AI/cloud computing/data centers). Tech giants are moving from "annualized green electricity" to "hourly 24/7 zero-carbon power supply."

Nuclear power provides stable, predictable zero-carbon baseload power. If nuclear-grade supply chains form domestically in the US, the deliverability of SMR new nuclear units/life extensions/power uprates will be higher, and the execution risk of long-term contracts (PPA/managed load/co-located facilities) between tech companies and nuclear operators will be lower.