Blue Energy Plans Shipyard-Built Nuclear Plants to Cut Build Time to 3 Years

Shifting the cost risk

According to CEO Jake Jurewicz, the point is not only speed. Nuclear projects run on average twice over their initial budgets and years late, so governments, utilities and builders are reluctant to carry the overrun risk. Blue Energy wants shipyards to build at a fixed price in their own yards and absorb that risk.

The gas-first approach serves the same goal. The steam turbine plant is built first and initially driven by steam from gas turbines. Banks can treat the project as a gas-fired power plant, which lowers interest costs and allows revenue within three years of groundbreaking.

The first project is in Victoria, Texas: 1 GW from gas in 2030, then up to five BWRX-300 small reactors, developed by Hitachi and GE Vernova, adding 1.5 GW from 2032. Crusoe, an AI data center company, is the power buyer.

Cost and precedents

In Ontario, Canada, the first BWRX-300 carries a budget of CAD 7.7 billion (about USD 5.6 billion) including shared facilities, roughly USD 18,500 per kilowatt. Blue Energy targets about USD 5,000 per kilowatt from its second plant onward, around a quarter, though the figures are not directly comparable.

History is a warning. Offshore Power Systems, a 1970 Westinghouse venture to mass-produce floating plants, lost its orders in 1978 and closed in 1984. Georgia's Vogtle, which also promised savings from factory-built modules, finished seven years late, with costs rising from USD 14 billion to about USD 35 billion according to AP. Blue Energy's plants would be on land, with only the blocks travelling by ship. Its published materials do not say what happens if the reactors never arrive and only the gas plant remains.

There is progress, though. The reactor is a scaled-down version of a design already approved in the US, and the NRC accepted the gas-first sequence. Blue Energy filed part of its construction permit application in September 2026 and says it has raised over USD 400 million, with Constellation among the investors. The company says local ratepayers will not fund construction costs.