President Donald Trump hosted several advanced nuclear companies at the White House on Friday, touting the administration’s efforts to build out nuclear energy to meet the surging power demand from artificial intelligence.
The event came just weeks after Antares Nuclear, Deployable Energy, Valar Atomics, and Aalo Atomics hit a deadline set by the president last year to develop advanced small nuclear reactors.
In a series of executive orders signed in May 2025, Trump set an ambitious target of having at least three new advanced small nuclear reactors hit “criticality” by July 4 this year.
Reaching criticality means a reactor is perfectly stable and its nuclear chain reaction is self-sustaining. This means the atoms splitting in the core of the nuclear reactor are able to produce enough neutrons to continue sustaining additional reactions that produce energy.
Reactors developed by Antares, Deployable, Aalo, and Valar hit the deadline, with Aalo’s reaching criticality in the early hours of the Fourth.
“Making sure that these groundbreaking designs were safe to build and test so quickly was a challenge that required a historic partnership between these innovative companies and our administration,” Trump said.
“In the past, it often took six years or more to approve a reactor design, if they were ever approved at all. Most of them didn’t get approved, and maybe rightfully so,” he continued. “But now, America is building again. America is dreaming again, and we’re leading the world in pioneering the next generation of nuclear power. There’s nobody even close.”
The Trump administration has been using criticality as a milestone, as it proves new designs that have yet to obtain commercial licenses from federal regulators can operate and are safe.
Aalo Atomics co-founder and CEO Matt Loszak confirmed to the Washington Examiner earlier this summer that the company plans to move forward with submitting its commercial licensing applications to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission later this year.
It has become clear over the past year that Trump is attempting to make the development and deployment of new nuclear energy a hallmark of his second administration.
Not only would expanding nuclear power in the U.S. support his energy dominance agenda, but the technology could help answer the crucial question looming over the Trump administration’s race against China for artificial intelligence: What is going to power AI?
Nuclear energy is considered one of the most reliable sources of energy today, with a capacity factor of 92.3%. This means a nuclear power plant, on average, can generate its maximum capacity 92.3% of the time.
Additionally, nuclear energy produces zero carbon emissions and can have a smaller physical footprint and infrastructure networks than utility-scale solar farms or even natural gas supply chains, which require wells, processing plants, pipelines, and much more.
Energy demand is rapidly increasing in the U.S. and globally, putting greater strain on national electrical grids and even the energy bills of consumers as grid operators seek to expand and upgrade grid infrastructure.
Data centers alone are expected to account for about 20% of the U.S. electricity consumption in 2035, up from around 5.9% this year, according to BloombergNEF.
As a result, both Republicans and Democrats are turning to nuclear power as a crucial source to meet growing demand, without sacrificing energy reliability or efforts to decarbonize the industry.
While the Biden administration took some action to build out new nuclear energy — cutting regulatory fees, approving subsidies for existing facilities, and allocating federal funds to restart the decommissioned Palisades nuclear plant in Michigan — Trump took it a step further last year with his four executive orders.
The executive orders called for overhauling and simplifying the regulatory processes for approving new nuclear energy projects, facilitating the construction of 10 large new reactors, and boosting domestic mining and enrichment of uranium to reduce reliance on foreign nations such as China and Russia.
A LOOK BACK ON TRUMP’S EFFORTS TO BOOST NUCLEAR ENERGY ONE YEAR LATER
“President Trump has done more than any other president in history to advance civilian nuclear energy development, innovation, and technology,” White House spokeswoman Taylor Rogers said.
“The Trump Administration has acted swiftly to implement the President’s executive orders, announcing a historic milestone: four advanced reactors authorized and achieving criticality,” she added. “In this Golden Age of America, President Trump has unleashed a nuclear energy renaissance to meet the nation’s growing energy needs while keeping prices low.”
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[ H/T Washington Examiner ]
