Christmas comes early for SMRs

Hello,

As noted in my send from last week, this will be the last post of mine for the year and I’ll take off through at least January 5th. I’ll be out in Joshua Tree over New Year’s and LA for a few days thereafter. If that’s where you call home or you’re visiting too, lmk.

Here’s what went down in sustainability and energy last week that caught my attention, including three more funding rounds for small modular reactor companies to cap off a year in which new funding for new fission was all the rage.

ONE STORY IN A SENTENCE AND A CHART

• New IEA projections see global coal demand peaking this year (at consumption of 8.85 billion tonnes) and falling (slowly) through 2030; I’ll believe it when I see it. Link.

NEWS, DATA, AND HEADLINES

• The Trump Administration announced it is taking steps to shut down the U.S. National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Boulder, Colorado, calling it a hub for "federal climate alarmism." This would be a significant step backward for science in the U.S., not just for studies broadly focused on climate change and its effects. FWIW, French atmospheric scientists, apocryphally, say “c'est parole d'évangile" when new NCAR research gets published. Link. Link.

• Power was restored for tens of thousands of San Francisco electricity customers late Saturday after an outage affected nearly a third of the city, impacting roughly 124,000 customers at its peak. The outage forced stores and transit stations to close, and led Waymo to suspend its driverless car services temporarily (raising questions around how autonomous they really are). A fire at a Pacific Gas & Electric substation in the South Market neighborhood was a key contributing factor. None of this is likely to slow Waymo’s roll, as earlier this week, news broke that it is in the market to raise over $15 billion at a valuation near $100 billion, with Alphabet set to lead and the company looking to fill out the round with billions from private backers. Link. Link. Link. Link.

• Power prices in the eastern U.S. (as measured, at least, by PJM capacity prices) hit a record high. Link.

• China's electricity consumption is expected to reach a record high in 2025, likely surpassing 10 trillion kilowatt-hours nationwide. Link.

• Trump Media & Technology Group will merge with nuclear fusion power startup TAE Technologies, which has been around since 1998, in an all-stock deal valued at $6 billion. If I know one thing about why TAE is taking this deal, I’d say it’s all about the money, honey. And that I wouldn’t personally touch the stock with a ten-foot pole. Link.

• China went from spending nothing on fusion energy in 2021 to making investments this year that outmatch the rest of the world's efforts combined. The Chinese government and private investors poured $2.1 billion into a new state-owned fusion company in summer 2025, an investment that alone is two and a half times the U.S. Department of Energy's annual fusion budget. Link.

• Thea Energy, a fusion technology company, announced the completion of its preconceptual fusion power plant design called "Helios." The system is designed to operate continuously and reliably provide approximately 400 MW net electricity to the grid, with a total thermal output of 1.1 GW, and has a major radius of 8 m, making it the most compact optimized stellarator power plant architecture. Link.

• A prominent nuclear science professor at MIT was shot and killed inside his home in Brookline, Massachusetts, on Monday night. Nuno Loureiro, 47, was a member of the school's departments of Nuclear Science & Engineering and Physics, and director of the MIT Plasma Science and Fusion Center. Link.

• Prescribed burn associations in South Dakota are using controlled fires to combat the spread of Eastern red cedar trees, which have been nicknamed the "green glacier" for their steady encroachment across Plains states. The Mid-Missouri River Prescribed Burn Association has conducted more than two dozen burns across nearly 9,500 acres. Ranchers increasingly see that fire-treated land can support more cattle without overgrazing. Link.

• Hundreds of Arctic rivers and streams are turning bright red-orange from naturally occurring iron spilling from long-frozen ground as temperatures warm, according to NOAA's annual Arctic Report Card. Link.

• Ford announced a stunning $19.5 billion write-down of planned electric vehicle and battery investments, the latest example of what happens when big bets chase ever-changing policy directives. The automaker plans to stop producing the F-150 Lightning and will instead start building a lineup of hybrids and cheaper EVs. Link.

• Galvanize, the asset management firm co-founded by billionaire investor Tom Steyer, has acquired a portfolio of seven industrial properties in the Chicago area as part of a plan to allocate $1.85 billion to buildings that it can decarbonize and resell. Link.

• Tesla competitor Slate has 150,000 reservations and says its mid-$20,000 price is "firm." Link.

• Magrathea announced plans to build its first commercial-scale magnesium production site using tail brine from the Smackover Formation in Arkansas, in partnership with Tetra Technologies. The company received $19.6 million from the US Department of War to re-commercialize an electrochemical process for domestic magnesium production. China currently produces over 90% of the world's magnesium. The U.S. produces zero. Link.

• The House voted 221-196 on Thursday to pass the SPEED Act, a bipartisan permitting reform bill to overhaul the National Environmental Policy Act. GOP lawmakers made last-minute changes to appease right-wing critics of offshore wind, causing some Democrats who planned to vote yes to defect. Passage in the Senate will be a challenge. Link.

• A California judge ruled that Tesla violated state law by marketing its driver assistance features using "misleading" terms like "Autopilot" and "Full Self-Driving Capability." The EV maker has 60 days to revise how it uses the term "Autopilot" or it could be barred from selling its cars in the state. Link.

• The nationwide transformer shortage is worsening as extreme weather destroys the existing grid, and data centers demand power infrastructure buildout at a rate not seen in decades. Orders for large transformers exceeded supply by about 14,000 units so far this year, according to consultancy Wood Mackenzie. Link.

• BlackRock's retreat from sustainable investing has cost the world's largest asset manager the business of at least two European pension funds. The PME group, which manages more than $69 billion in retirement savings for Dutch workers, decided to end its relationship with BlackRock, and the Dutch healthcare workers’ pension group, PFZW, withdrew more than $16 billion. Link.

• New electric vehicles registered in the EU totaled 1.45 million in 2024, compared to 1.54 million in 2023, as EV sales have slowed due to government incentive rollbacks. Link.

• The Energy Department approved a preliminary safety analysis for advanced nuclear startup Oklo's fuel fabrication facility at Idaho National Laboratory, the first approval under DOE's Fuel Line Pilot Program. The facility will produce fuel for Oklo's Aurora reactor, which uses fast neutrons rather than the thermal neutrons used in conventional reactors. Link.

• Green cement manufacturer Fortera certified its ReAct™ low-carbon cement to meet all six ASTM C1157 performance categories simultaneously, a level of versatility that typically requires four separate portland cement formulations. Link.

• Solar manufacturer T1 Energy has started building a $400 million to $425 million solar cell fabrication plant around 50 miles from Austin, Texas. The facility will have a capacity of 2.1 gigawatts of cell production annually, larger than the existing U.S. capacity to manufacture silicon-based solar cells, and is slated to come online late next year. Link.

• Mantel Capture announced the initiation of a front-end engineering design (FEED) study for a commercial-scale project with a Canadian oil and gas producer. The project is designed to capture approximately 60,000 tonnes of CO₂ and generate 150,000 tonnes of high-pressure steam per year using Mantel's molten borate carbon capture system. Link.

CURATED DEALS

Larger funding rounds:

• Radiant Nuclear, based out of El Segundo, CA, raised a $300+ million round at a $1.8+ billion post-money valuation to develop portable nuclear microreactors. The deal was co-led by Draper Associates and Boost VC, with Washington Harbour Partners, Friends & Family Capital, Andreessen Horowitz, Align Ventures, DCVC, Founders Fund, ARK Venture Fund, and Chevron Technology Ventures also participating. Link.

• Last Energy, based out of Washington, D.C., raised a $100 million Series C round led by the Astera Institute for its steel-encased small modular nuclear reactor development business. AE Ventures, Galaxy Fund, Gigafund, JAM Fund, The Haskell Company, Ultranative, and Woori Technology also participated. Link.

• Fuse Energy, based out of London, raised a $70 million round at a $5 billion valuation to facilitate trading of renewable power assets and to sell energy directly to households and businesses. Lowercarbon Capital and Balderton Capital co-led; Ribbit Capital, Lakestar, Latitude, QuantumLight Capital, Future Positive Capital, Creandum, Accel, Rosberg Ventures, and DSquared participated. Link.

• Blykalla, based out of Sweden, raised $50+ million in equity funding to speed its development process for its own small modular reactors. Oklo, a prominent American SMR startup, invested. Link.

Medium-sized funding rounds:

• IND Technology, based out of Richmond, Australia, raised $33 million in growth equity funding co-led by Angeleno Group and Energy Impact Partners to provide infrastructure monitoring tech for utilities. Edison International and Virescent Ventures also invested. Link.

• Vital Lyfe, based out of Hawthorne, CA, raised a $24 million seed round co-led by Interlagos and General Catalyst to develop portable systems that turn almost any natural water source into drinkable water. Generational Partners, Cantos, Space VC, and Also Capital also invested. Link.

• Endra, based out of Stockholm, raised a $20 million seed round led by Notion Capital to automate mechanical, electrical, and plumbing design for commercial buildings. Norrsken VC also participated. Link.

• Carbonfuture, based out of Breisgau, Germany, raised an undisclosed amount of Series A2 funding as it surpassed 1.5 million tonnes of durable carbon removal facilitated. SIX led the round with participation from Idemitsu Americas Holdings. Link.

Smaller funding rounds:

• Pyxis, based out of Singapore, raised S$13 million (~$9.6 million) at the first close of its S$18 million growth round for its maritime electrification startup. Shift4Good, Motion Ventures, and MOL PLUS invested. Link.

• Everbloom, based out of San Francisco, raised $8+ million in equity funding from Hoxton Ventures and SOSV to upcycle keratin waste from chicken feathers to create biodegradable textile fibres that mimic cashmere and polyester. Link.

• Those Vegan Cowboys, based out of Ghent, Belgium, raised €6.25 million (~$7.3 million) to scale production of its animal-free, dairy-identical casein protein and move its cheese, yoghurt, and chocolate applications toward commercialisation. Link.

• Wakuli, based out of Amsterdam, Netherlands, raised a €5 million (~$5.85 million) Series A funding round led by the European Circular Bioeconomy Fund to scale its regenerative coffee business. Rabobank, ABN AMRO Sustainable Impact Fund, and Icecat Capital invested as well. Link.

• PopWheels, based out of New York, raised $2.3 million in equity funding and up to $2.4 million in lines of credit to provide battery-swapping kiosks for NYC delivery workers’ ebikes. Investors included The Partnership Fund for New York City, MetaProp, Closed Loop Ventures, and New York Ventures. Link.

• MiAlgae, based out of Scotland, a biotech startup, has started building a commercial-scale facility in Grangemouth—backed by a £3 million (~$4.0 million) U.K. government investment—to upcycle whisky byproducts into fish-free algal omega-3 and to scale production ahead of a planned 2026 opening. Link.

Funds:

• PSV Hafnium, based out of Denmark, closed its first €60 million (~$70.2 million) fund to invest in around 25 Nordic science-driven startups emerging from research institutions. It is backed by the European Investment Fund, Danish sovereign fund EIFO, PSV Foundry, and other investors. Link.

• Cloudberry, based out of Helsinki and London, completed a €30 million (~$35.1 million) first close for its debut fund to invest in semiconductors, photonics, and advanced materials. Link.

Adios,

— Nick