Three Mile AIsland Tech giant Microsoft is betting big on nuclear power to power its extremely electricity-hungry AI models. On its own, that shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise. Machine learning uses a notoriously huge amount of power, leading companies like Microsoft to look for greener alternatives to fossil fuels like coal or natural gas. This is where things get wild, though. The company is so all-in on AI, the Wall Street Journal reports, that it’s currently training an AI to do the paperwork for setting up new nuclear power plants. “For the past six months,” the paper reported, “a team of Microsoft employees have been training a large language model with US nuclear regulatory and licensing documents, hoping to expedite the paperwork required for such approvals, which can take years and cost hundreds of millions of dollars.” Nuclear Option Think of the cost savings! Needless to say, given AI’s track record at totally screwing things up, we hope a human is breezing over the paperwork before they break ground on any new nuclear facilities. Instead of going all in on solar and wind power, tech companies like Microsoft and Google are increasingly turning to the idea of small modular reactors (SMRs), which are scaled-down power plants that aim to reduce construction costs through the standardization of components and systems. Despite dozens of designs being considered worldwide, there are zero SMRs currently in operation in the US. Permitting and construction for SMRs is still incredibly expensive, per the…Microsoft Training AI to Do Paperwork to Build Nuclear Power Plants