Amazon's Indiana nuclear deal is a study; AEP's 69 GW of sold load is the story
AEP, Amazon and X-energy will study twelve small reactors at a retired Indiana coal plant, with no cost, date or contract price disclosed. AEP has contracted 69 GW of new load against the 33 GW of capacity it owns or contracts, and its October 28 capital plan prices the gap.
Vincent Jiang · 3 min read
Twelve reactors on a retired coal plant
On October 19, American Electric Power+2.14% — American Electric Power, up 2.14 percent today (Nasdaq: AEP) and reactor developer X-energy$1B — X-energy, private, latest valuation $1B (Nasdaq: XE) signed a joint development agreement to study twelve 80-MW Xe-100 small modular reactors at the retired Breed coal station in Sullivan County, Indiana: 960 MW that would be the state's first commercial nuclear generation 123.
Amazon−4.32% — Amazon, down 4.32 percent today supplies milestone-based development funding and would be the plant's first customer, under a long-term contract the companies say covers the facility's costs and operations 14. It is the second project in an Amazon and X-energy alliance targeting more than 5 GW of new US nuclear capacity by 2039 4.
A study with no price on it
The announcement carries no capital cost, no funding amount, no contract term or price, no ownership split, no investment-decision date and no construction schedule 2. No small modular reactor has been built or commissioned in the United States, and the only utility-scale reactor completed there in 11 years is Vogtle 3 and 4 in Georgia 5. Operation in Indiana, if the project proceeds at all, is put early next decade 5.
69 gigawatts sold, 33 in the fleet
The demand is real: Indiana Michigan Power, AEP's utility there, expects Indiana peak load to jump from 2,800 MW to more than 7,000 MW by 2030 6. Supply is the question.
AEP told investors on July 30 that it holds 69 GW of contracted load additions through 2030, up 6 GW in a single quarter, against roughly 33,000 MW of owned and contracted capacity, about 25 GW of it owned outright at the end of 2025 178.
One week of buying, the reactor study plus a $4 billion, 702-MW Bloom fuel cell plant for Google announced October 14 (covered by The Inference on October 21) plus a 190-MW first order of Mainspring linear generators under an option reaching 1.6 GW by 2034, added about 1.85 GW, under 3% of the load signed 7.
AEP has sold 69 gigawatts of future electricity, owns or contracts 33, and bought 1.85.
One week of generation deals bought 1.85 GW against 69 GW of contracted load
Data
| Value | |
|---|---|
| Contracted load through 2030 | 69 GW |
| Owned + contracted fleet | 33 GW |
| Indiana SMR study | 0.96 GW |
| Wyoming fuel cells | 0.7 GW |
| Mainspring first order | 0.19 GW |
Who pays if the build slips
AEP chief executive Bill Fehrman says the agreements provide "all necessary capital protections and financial safeguards"; Josh Weissman, Amazon's data center infrastructure chief, says Amazon will "pay our full costs without passing them to others," language Amazon ties to the White House Ratepayer Protection Pledge 12. Both framings put the bill on Amazon, and neither names who carries a decade of delay on a first-of-a-kind design.
The market has priced the growth anyway: BTIG upgraded AEP to Buy at $147 on October 20, the quarterly dividend rose to $0.97 from $0.95, and the stock closed October 21 at $127.39, up 10.5% this year, at 3.06 times sales against a five-year median of 2.62, with negative free cash flow, interest coverage of 2.43 and an Altman Z-score of 0.93 89.
Capital spending has outrun operating cash in nine of the last twelve quarters
- Capital spending
- Operating cash flow
Data
| Capital spending | Operating cash flow | |
|---|---|---|
| Q3 '23 | $1.73B | $1.79B |
| Q4 '23 | $1.61B | $1.34B |
| Q1 '24 | $1.76B | $1.44B |
| Q2 '24 | $1.56B | $1.46B |
| Q3 '24 | $1.85B | $2.17B |
| Q4 '24 | $2.86B | $1.73B |
| Q1 '25 | $2.1B | $1.45B |
| Q2 '25 | $3.28B | $1.22B |
| Q3 '25 | $2.28B | $2.46B |
| Q4 '25 | $4.25B | $1.81B |
| Q1 '26 | $3.8B | $1.52B |
| Q2 '26 | $3.13B | $1.9B |
The filings underneath show the strain: capital spending outran operating cash flow in nine of the last twelve quarters, $13.4 billion against $7.7 billion across the four most recent 10.
October 28 prices the promise
AEP reports third-quarter results and its 2027-2031 capital plan on October 28 7. The $78 billion 2026-2030 base already holds only about half of the 13 GW of gas turbines AEP has secured, and the Wyoming fuel cell plant sits in a further "more than $10 billion" of line-of-sight spending; a December 2026 deadline on the fuel-cell offtake comes first 7.
Amazon, for its part, has spent or announced more than $30 billion in Indiana, $15 billion of it for 2.4 GW of data centers 5. Until October 28, 69 gigawatts of sold load rests on 1.85 gigawatts of ordered metal and a reactor that has never run 5.
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