In every industry, there are seemingly simple solutions and they are tossed out as the way forward. Then reality and regulations work their way into the solutions and the solution becomes complex. A wonderful example is data centers and nuclear power.

In an article by Laila Kearney and Timothy Gardner of Reuters, two large companies Microsoft and Constellation Energy have announced a plan to restate the nuclear plant known as 3 Mile Island in Pennsylvania. The energy produced would be used by Microsoft to power data centers as they need a great deal of power to operate.

The simple solution is once nuclear plants are operational the cost to generate electricity falls as the output rises. The downside of nuclear is what to do with the wastes.

US data center power use is expected to triple between 2023 and 2030 and will require about 47 gigawatts of new generation capacity, according to Goldman Sachs estimates. While wind, solar and natural gas are very helpful, nuclear would be a good option.

The 3 Mile Island plant made global headlines in 1979 with a partial meltdown in 1979, at the time the worst nuclear incident in US history. The reopening would cost $1.6 billion to offset Microsoft’s data-center consumption in the region.

Key permits to reopen the facility have not been filed yet.

Edwin Lyman, a nuclear safety expert at the Union of Concerned Scientists noted resuming the use of equipment and infrastructure that has been dormant for 5 years, could be tricky. Constellation Energy should expect to encounter problems that will be costly and time-consuming to fix.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, there are many ideas in the world – some are simple, some complex but most follow somewhere in the middle and execution is very important. It is easier to do if there are larger credit facilities to draw upon, but money is not everything, the ideas are. For profit making companies, they have a reasonable idea of what works and what does not and having the ability to say no is a good thing. What ideas have the companies you invested in said no to?

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.