Constellation Energy remains bullish on data centers co-located with nuclear power plants despite FERC rejecting terms for the expansion of one such agreement in a high-profile ruling. 

Data centers are critical to the economy and national security of the United States, and co-location is among the best ways to get them built quickly, CEO Joe Dominguez said Nov. 4 during a call with financial analysts. 

The nation’s largest nuclear power plant operator is working to restart the reactor it owns at the former Three Mile Island station to help meet the projected rise in power demand. 

Constellation already has signed a power purchase agreement with Microsoft for the zero-carbon output from the reactor, which has been renamed the Crane Clean Energy Center. 

Dominguez noted the company could boost its nuclear generation an additional 1 GW or more through uprating the facilities and said customers have expressed interest in contracting for that output. 

The Nov. 4 conference call was intended to provide details and take questions on Constellation’s third-quarter financials, but Dominguez immediately launched into his thoughts on FERC rejecting terms of the deal to expand Amazon’s data center co-located at Talen’s nuclear plant (ER24-2172) after a Nov. 1 technical conference. (See related stories, FERC Dives into Data Center Co-location Debate at Technical Conference and FERC Rejects Expansion of Co-located Data Center at Susquehanna Nuclear Plant.) 

Nearly 10 minutes into the call, Dominguez switched to Constellation’s quarterly financials, which once again were strong: GAAP net income was $3.82 per share and adjusted operating earnings were $2.74 per share, up from $2.26 and $2.13 respectively in the third quarter of 2023. 

The company again bumped its 2024 earnings projection higher and said it would grow its earnings per share by at least 13% through 2030. 

Despite this, Constellation Energy stock closed 12.5% lower in heavy trading Nov. 4, a plunge widely presented as fallout from the FERC ruling. 

Dominguez downplayed the significance of the ruling in his opening remarks and again during the Q&A with financial analysts. 

It was a very narrow decision on the proposed interconnection service agreement, he noted. 

“In Constellation’s view, the 2-1 ruling rejecting Talen’s ISA by a fraction of the commission is not the final word from FERC on co-location,” Dominguez said. “We believe that all of the commissioners, including the two who recused themselves from Friday’s decision, understand the critical importance of providing additional guidance.” 

The steps that will allow for co-location could come from FERC, from RTOs or from the private sector parties pursuing the deals, he said. 

Dominguez rejected criticism that co-located behind-the-meter data centers would not pay their share of costs to build and maintain grid capacity and would create capacity problems by diverting so much generation off the grid. 

The data centers still would pay to support the grid, he said, and the nuclear reactors would switch their output back to the grid in times of emergency. Also, he said, if a co-located load had backup power, it could offer that power to the grid. 

“These issues should be brought together and advanced at FERC,” Dominguez said. “Frankly, I think part of the issue with the ISA proceeding is that it did not bring these issues together, and understandably, some of the commissioners want to see the complete package. We will pursue this regulatory clarity while simultaneously pursuing commercial strategies for co-location that are permitted under existing rules.” 

An analyst asked whether Constellation is broadening its strategy in the wake of the ruling. 

“Our foot is on the accelerator, pressed all the way down on deals, whether they’re front- or behind-the-meter,” Dominguez replied. “Speed to market is very clearly the most important thing for customers, and so that’s going to depend on the transmission configuration in different places, and certain places are going to be, frankly, more attractive [than] others for the data economy customers, and we’re going to follow where they need to go.” 

An analyst asked what sort of timeline Dominguez expects for gaining regulatory clarity on co-located loads. 

Dominguez did not know — the FERC decision was not yet 72 hours old by that point, and most of those hours were weekend days.  

“I probably would agree with you that there’s not a quick fix,” he said. “It’s not going to happen tomorrow, but there are a lot of parties interested in moving this forward.” 

Dominguez added: “I think a bigger development wasn’t the ISA, which was a narrow thing, but how do we deal with the comments that came out of the tech conference and craft something globally that addresses those comments?” 

Another analyst asked whether hyperscalers would vote with their feet and look to build their facilities elsewhere, given slow movement in PJM. 

“Where are they going to go? Right? It’s not like it’s a lot better anywhere else than PJM,” Dominguez replied. “They’re not slowing the pace of their investment, but what they’re seeing is that there’s no nirvana out there. There’s no place where you could easily hook up the amount of energy that they’re looking to hook up.” 

He added: “I’ll tell you what won’t be the solution, and I know this with absolute certainty: They’re not going to wait around for 10 years until somebody builds a power plant, transmission lines, to power the data economy. If that’s the U.S. plan, then we’ve got bigger problems than picking the right RTO.”