Manufacturing News
October 24, 2026
October 24, 2026 · Sullivan County · Story 2 of 4
Amazon Funds 12 Nuclear Reactors Near Terre Haute
Amazon announced Oct. 19 it will fund a 960-megawatt nuclear plant on the site of a demolished coal plant just south of Terre Haute in Sullivan County. American Electric Power would operate the plant and X-energy would supply 12 Xe-100 small modular reactors, with Amazon as the first customer. The deal is three times the size of the companies' first project and sits inside a joint goal of 5 gigawatts of new U.S. nuclear capacity by 2039.
The entire timeline depends on a plant 1,100 miles away. X-energy's first Xe-100 project, at Dow Chemical's Seadrift, Texas site, hasn't broken ground, and the Texas Attorney General has sued Dow over the site's water and waste compliance. That lawsuit targets Dow, not X-energy's reactor design, but the Department of Energy is funding half of Seadrift's construction cost, so an injunction there would freeze federal money and stall the only proof of concept the Terre Haute timeline depends on. Size Amazon's commitment correctly: this is Amazon's third nuclear deal running at once, after an $18 billion Talen Energy agreement in Pennsylvania and a $3 billion Constellation deal in Maryland, which makes Terre Haute a mid-tier bet in Amazon's nuclear strategy, not its flagship.
- Impact
- The entire Indiana timeline rides on a facility 1,100 miles away: X-energy's first Xe-100 project, the Seadrift, Texas plant for Dow Chemical, hasn't broken ground and is the subject of a Texas Attorney General lawsuit over 'habitual non-compliance' with water and waste rules dating to 2020: Dow's liability, not X-energy's reactor design, but DOE is funding half of Seadrift's construction costs, so any injunction there freezes federal money and stalls the only proof-of-concept the Indiana project depends on. It's also worth sizing Amazon's commitment correctly: this is Amazon's third concurrent nuclear deal after an $18 billion Talen Energy PPA in Pennsylvania and a $3 billion Constellation deal in Maryland, making the Terre Haute project mid-tier, not the flagship, in Amazon's own nuclear strategy.
- Watch
- The NRC's final-phase review of X-energy's construction permit for the Seadrift, Texas site, and the outcome of the Texas AG's lawsuit against Dow's Seadrift complex.
- For the huddle
If X-energy's first commercial reactor at Seadrift slips or stalls over the Texas lawsuit, how does that change our planning horizon for any power-supply assumptions tied to the Terre Haute project?
Treat the Terre Haute timeline as tied to Seadrift's outcome: the Department of Energy is funding half of that Texas construction, so any injunction there freezes federal money and pushes the Indiana project's in-service date out with it.
Sources
- Amazon Funds Plans for 12 Nuclear Reactors in Indiana · techcrunch.com
Earlier coverage
- Amazon, AEP, and X-energy Weigh 960 MW Nuclear Plant in Sullivan County
- Sullivan County Siren Outage Exposes Indiana Data Center Power Risk
- Merom Generating Station Gets $27M Federal Subsidy and a 12-Year NIPSCO Data Center Deal
- Hallador Merom: What the DOE Award Actually Is, and the NIPSCO-Hallador Capacity Deal That Isn't
- $65B Industrial Park Proposed in Sullivan County
From the brief, October 24, 2026
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