California’s Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant has adopted cutting-edge AI technology, deploying Nvidia’s H100 AI chips to enhance safety measures with its ‘Neutron Enterprise’ tool.
America’s first nuclear power plant to use artificial intelligence is the Diablo Canyon power plant, owned by Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E), which is the last operational one in California. The ‘Neutron Enterprise’ tool, which will be the first nuclear plant in the nation to use AI, has been deployed at Diablo Canyon.
Diablo Canyon is a nuclear power plant located in San Luis Obispo County, California.
The plant has two active reactors, Unit 1 and Unit 2, with a combined capacity of approximately 2,250 megawatts (MW).
It is operated by Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) and began commercial operation in 1986.
Diablo Canyon generates enough electricity to power over 3 million homes in California.
The Deployment of Neutron Enterprise
Less than 18 months ago, Diablo Canyon was set to begin decommissioning this year. However, the California Public Utility Commission voted to delay the process for five years, pushing it back to 2029 and 2030. PG&E partnered with a startup called Atomic Canyon, which specializes in nuclear plants, to deploy the ‘Neutron Enterprise’ tool. The partnership brought Nvidia’s high-powered H100 AI chips to the plant, providing the necessary compute power for generative artificial intelligence.
The Purpose of Neutron Enterprise
NEutron Enterprise is primarily used to summarize millions of regulatory documents that have been fed into it. According to Atomic Canyon CEO Trey Lauderdale, this use case is not risky, despite the tech’s tendency to make factual mistakes. ‘A copilot rather than a decision-maker,’ emphasizes PG&E executive Maureen Zalawick, assisting human employees rather than replacing them.
Concerns About AI in Nuclear Power Plants
Tamara Kneese, head of Data & Society’s Climate, Technology, and Justice program, expresses concerns about trusting PG&E to safely use generative AI in a nuclear setting. She notes that while using AI to sift through documents is worthwhile, the company’s history of polluting practices raises questions about its ability to handle complex tasks like this.
Pacific Gas and Electric Company, commonly known as PG&E, is an American investor-owned utility company headquartered in San Francisco, California.
Founded in 1905, the company provides natural gas and electricity to approximately 16 million people across Northern and Central California.
With over $100 billion in annual revenue, PG&E is one of the largest utility companies in the United States.
The company has faced significant challenges, including a major wildfire that led to its bankruptcy filing in 2019.
Regulatory Oversight
California lawmakers have expressed interest in the tailored usage of Atomic Canyon and PG&E’s ‘Neutron Enterprise’ program. However, it remains to be seen whether this narrow functionality will remain that way under regulatory oversight.
