Fermi America's nuclear plans just cleared their first regulatory hurdle.
NRC staff have preliminarily recommended issuing combined licenses for four Westinghouse AP1000 reactors at Project Matador, Fermi's planned power and AI campus outside Amarillo, Texas, according to a draft environmental impact statement the agency put out for comment on October 9th.
Together, the four units would add over 4.4 GW of nuclear generation capacity to the private grid.
It took 15 months from application, and Fermi wrote the draft itself as the first test of an NRC pilot that lets applicants prepare their own environmental reviews under staff supervision. The agency expects that to cut its in-house review time by about half.
The NRC is targeting a final version in December. The harder part is the safety review, which has no schedule yet. Fermi pulled the site-specific portion of its application and plans to refile it by Dec. 31, and a mandatory hearing and Commission vote come after that.
Fermi wants its first reactor running by 2032, meaning the NRC is far from the company's problem.
Last November, we warned that storm clouds were gathering as Fermi struggled to sign its first major tenant. A month later, the stock cratered 50% when that prospect pulled out of a $150 million construction funding agreement.
In April, shares crashed another 22% after the board ousted co-founder and CEO Toby Neugebauer and the CFO resigned. As we put it then, "without tenants there is no company."
But, Fermi finally has one, on paper. In August, it signed a binding 15-year lease with TensorWave, an AMD-only GPU cloud, for 222 MW worth about $6.5 billion, with options to expand past 650 MW.
Phased delivery starts in the second half of 2027.
The lease hasn't closed yet. Fermi pushed the deadline from Sept. 30 to Oct. 31 to finish a lease guarantee, and it still needs project financing. On Tuesday, AMD agreed to provide credit support for the lease.
So AMD sells TensorWave its chips, has invested in TensorWave, and now backs TensorWave's lease. Circular?
Still waiting on first power
On-site power is running behind. Last November, Fermi promised "1 GW of capacity online by late 2026." As of August, they moved the goal posts to "about 200 megawatts of initial commercial power over the next six months."
Fermi has taken delivery of six Siemens SGT-800s (nearly 300 MW) and three larger Siemens F-class units, and three GE Vernova 6B turbines reached the site recently. NAES has been hired to run the fleet, and Hillcore Energy Capital has signed a framework deal to finance, build and own about 2.6 GW more on site.
The old founder won't let go
Neugebauer, still Fermi's largest shareholder, sued over his firing in May.
He suspended a campaign to call a special meeting in July, and last month a Texas Business Court judge declined to temporarily block a 70% supermajority bylaw and new voting rules the board adopted after his ouster. He has since sued three directors.
The board, meanwhile, named former TerraPower CEO and Bechtel veteran Lee McIntire as CEO in August.
The next few weeks will be busy:
