Aalo Atomics has announced a collaboration with Microsoft on use of Microsoft’s Generative AI for Energy Permitting Solution Accelerator and AI agents to streamline complex regulatory and operational workflows to support Aalo’s nuclear manufacturing and deployment programmes.
The project won two awards at Microsoft’s annual Hackathon in September. Microsolf describes hacking as “taking something apart and putting it back together, better. Or creating something brand new from your great idea. Or making technical or process improvements to a programme, online tool, or design. Or making a difference and hacking for good.”
“Our collaboration with Microsoft demonstrates what’s possible when leading AI technology combines with leading engineering,” said Aalo Co-founder and Chief Technical Operator Yasir Arafat. “So far, we have tackled three of the most impactful challenges in the nuclear industry – using AI to simplify, accelerate, and ultimately transform how complex energy systems are licensed, built and operated at scale. We look forward to continuing this collaboration with Microsoft.”
Darryl Willis, Corporate Vice President, Energy & Resources Industry, at Microsoft, noted: “Aalo Atomics’s participation in the Microsoft Hackathon is a powerful example of how collaboration can accelerate innovation. Together, the team began developing AI agents that leverage rich internal and external datasets, like design data and risk models, to embed generative AI into Aalo’s workflows, boosting permitting speed and operational efficiency. We’re excited to scale these capabilities to help Aalo advance carbon-free, factory-built nuclear power.”
Jon Guidroz, Aalo’s Senior Vice President for Commercialisation noted: “Permitting remains one of the greatest bottlenecks in nuclear deployments. By integrating Microsoft Azure AI Foundry and agentic AI technology, we’re turning regulatory complexity into actionable intelligence, bringing us closer to building the clean-energy future, faster than ever before.”
In October, Aalo completed its Preliminary Design Review for its experimental reactor, Aalo-X, with more than 20 independent reviewers from the Department of Energy (DOE), Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and others. Aalo-X is an experimental, extra-modular reactor (XMR) that uses sodium as a coolant and is fuelled by low-enriched uranium dioxide. The Aalo-X is a 10 MWe experimental power plant that bridges the gap between smaller microreactors and traditional small modular reactors (SMRs). The reactor and all its plant components are factory-built in modules for rapid on-site assembly.
In August, Aalo broke ground at Idaho National Laboratory (INL) to start construction of its first Aalo-X. The reactor will be manufactured at Aalo’s pilot factory in Austin, Texas, before being transported to and installed at the INL site. The test reactor is the precursor to the Aalo Pod, a 50 MWe XMR power plant designed for data centres Each fully modular Aalo Pod will contain five factory-built, sodium-cooled, Aalo-1 reactors. The company says it will be in commercial use by 2029.
Aalo-X was selected by DOE to participate in President Trump’s Nuclear Reactor Pilot Program and is aiming to complete construction and to achieve criticality by July 2026. The Aalo-X has secured official site allocation from DOE’s Idaho Operations Office (DOE-ID), and received an Environmental Assessment Determination from DOE, which expedites the environmental review process. However, it remains to be seen. whether a sodium-cooled reactor can go from preliminary design to criticality in one year, even with AI support.
Microsoft has chosen nuclear as part of its strategy to secure reliable, carbon-free electricity to meet growing energy demand. It has signed long-term agreements including a 20-year power purchase agreement (PPA) with Constellation Energy to restart the Crane Clean Energy Centre, formerly known as the Three Mile Island Unit 1 and long-term PPA with fusion energy technology company Helion.
