The U.S. government is now offering companies $17.5 billion in loans to help finance costs for long-lead time items needed to build large commercial nuclear reactors.
U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright recently announced the American Nuclear Supply Chain Loans as conditional loans under the agency’s Office of Energy Dominance Financing (EDF).
The U.S. Department of Energy’s loans will finance five eligible projects sponsored by utilities and energy companies to deploy 10 large-scale commercial nuclear reactors within three years.
“Long-lead items [LLI] are complex components of a nuclear power plant that require the longest time for manufacturing and delivery,” DOE noted. “EDF financing will support up to five loans, each loan supporting two reactors at a project site.”
The loans are projected to be spent on nuclear power plant components sourced from over 100 domestic companies located across 40 states. Cost savings are to come from bulk purchases of long-lead reactor components.
LLI items include prefabricated structural modules, nuclear reactor pressure vessels, steam generators and reactor coolant pumps.
Wright described the loans as “reviving the supply chain needed for America to once again build large-scale commercial reactors.” At the same time, the loans are to reduce associated construction costs in “the next American nuclear renaissance.”
The loans require partnering with Westinghouse Electric Co. since its AP1000 pressurized water reactor is the only U.S.-licensed, large-scale commercial advanced nuclear reactor type currently operating in the nation.
Dan Sumner, Westinghouse CEO, issued a statement in reaction to the conditional loan announcement.
“America has always won when it thinks big and builds for the future. If we want to lead in artificial intelligence, advanced manufacturing, and the industries that will define the next century – we need more American baseload energy,” Sumner said. “This means building industrialized nuclear power at fleet scale, creating long-term economic growth, thousands of high-quality jobs, strengthening supply chains and revitalizing communities.”
The company noted it signed letters of intent with seven possible partners. The DOE loans require Westinghouse to form partnerships with no more than five eligible utilities/energy companies “to procure LLI for projects with two reactors each.”
A DOE fact sheet on the nuclear supply chain loans states that each project will be jointly owned by Westinghouse and a utility/energy company partner.
“For each of the five loans, Westinghouse and their partner will commit approximately $1 billion in project equity upfront prior to accessing DOE loan funds,” DOE explained.
The projects are expected to result in an eventual 11 gigawatts of new, firm baseload nuclear-generated electricity.
The conditional loans are meant to help meet President Trump’s Executive Order: Reinvigorating the Nuclear Industrial Base issued in May 2025, with 10 new large reactors that have complete designs under construction by 2030.
Energy Dominance Financing
Under the Trump administration, the DOE has restructured its EDF goals to support six priority sectors including nuclear power, critical materials/minerals, geothermal power and electrical transmission/grids.
For example, EDF closed two priority project loans last year amounting to $2.6 billion.
- $1 billion—to Constellation Energy Generation LLC for the Crane Clean Energy Center restart project (formerly known as Three Mile Island). The loan will partially finance restarting a reactor that stopped operating in 2019 without being fully decommissioned.
- $1.6 billion—to an American Electric Power Co. subsidiary to improve the electrical grid through reconductoring and rebuilding 5,000 miles of transmission lines across Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Oklahoma and West Virginia.
The objective of these six priority sector energy project loans is to provide financial incentives for U.S. companies to help foster the Trump administration’s desire boost domestic energy production.
