MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
The U.S. is increasingly turning to nuclear energy to fill power demands. Small modular reactors are being developed in Tennessee and Michigan, and in Kentucky, private investment is fueling a new uranium enrichment plant. Derek Operle with member station WKMS was at the groundbreaking in western Kentucky.
DEREK OPERLE, BYLINE: A bipartisan coalition of officials, nuclear industry folks, venture capitalists and locals gathered near Paducah to celebrate big news - the announcement to build what its owners call the country's first privately funded uranium enrichment operation. Both of Kentucky's U.S. senators were there - Republicans Rand Paul and Mitch McConnell - and so was Democratic Governor Andy Beshear, who said the state many still think of as coal country is ready for its next step.
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ANDY BESHEAR: This is the story of Kentucky. The energy produced from our lands and from the sweat of our hardworking people helped grow our nation into a global economic powerhouse.
OPERLE: This new enrichment operation will be built at the former Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant. It used to be a government-run nuclear enrichment facility until it closed up shop in 2013. The private company behind this new $1.5 billion development is General Matter. Its CEO, Scott Nolan, is a former SpaceX employee. He says the history of the Kentucky site was a big attraction for the company.
SCOTT NOLAN: So this is the last place that's done enrichment, and we think it makes sense as the next place that enrichment happens.
OPERLE: General Matter was incubated inside of Founders Fund, the venture capital firm co-created by billionaire investor and Trump ally Peter Thiel. Nolan's company has not yet enriched any uranium, but he was in the Oval Office when President Trump signed the executive orders to fast-track nuclear energy in the U.S. and end its reliance on foreign uranium. It launched early last year and already has two federal contracts with the Department of Energy to supply uranium for reactors across the country. Under the Biden administration, Russian imports of low-enriched uranium were banned, though waivers were granted until 2028. Rowen Price, a senior policy adviser for nuclear energy with the left-of-center D.C. think tank Third Way, says now is the time to bolster the country's domestic uranium enrichment.
ROWEN PRICE: This is something that's been dominated by Russia for decades, particularly as the U.S. kind of lapsed in its desire to pursue nuclear. And now that we have such rising demand, you know, the need for fuel is more urgent than ever.
OPERLE: With electricity demand projected to increase 50% by 2050 in the U.S., Price says nuclear power could be a, quote, "clean, reliable and economical" answer.
PRICE: Nuclear looks like a very strong option, and I think that is something that is becoming more bipartisan. It's becoming more widely understood.
OPERLE: What's not known yet is the exact technology General Matter will be using. Nolan says that's one of the things the company doesn't talk about yet, but Erik Cothron would like to know. He's with the Nuclear Innovation Alliance, a pro-nuclear advocacy group. Cothron says what the company has shared so far about its plans for enrichment is sparse.
ERIK COTHRON: This complete lack of information at this point, with the announcements that are being made, does raise questions about how developed that technology is, if it has been demonstrated, if it could scale to meet the needs.
OPERLE: That lack of transparency also worries Kimberly Eckenberg. She lives just over a mile from the site of the planned project with her husband and three children. Eckenberg says she wants more information and worries about the fate of her small West Paducah neighborhood, where people regularly walk and bike and her twin 4-year-olds play on an inflatable slip-and-slide in their front yard.
KIMBERLY ECKENBERG: I think it's time that we really pay attention to what we're doing environmentally with big business.
OPERLE: Eckenberg says she plans to pay attention as the project moves forward. General Matter says it wants to be ready to fuel all the new reactors that are being developed and hopes to have their Kentucky plant running by 2030.
For NPR News, I'm Derek Operle in Paducah.
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