March 11, 2026

How the Pentagon Is Fumbling the Nuclear Energy Renaissance

By: Will Rogers

This article was originally published in The National Interest.

In June 2024, the Department of Defense (DOD) announced it was stepping back into the nuclear reactor business when the Army launched its Advanced Nuclear Power for Installations (ANPI) program, a partnership with the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU) focused on the design and build of fixed on-base reactors ranging from 2 to 10 megawatts (MW) for critical missions.

Rather than presenting a unified plan for commercializing advanced reactors, DOD has splintered into competing visions that risk undermining the momentum industry was counting on, and a commercial breakthrough may be slipping away.

For DOD, advanced reactors promise to reduce its reliance on a fragile commercial power grid that provides electricity to more than 95 percent of US military installations. That power grid faces surging demand from artificial intelligence (AI) data centers and semiconductor chip manufacturing. Increasingly extreme weather is also causing outages that exceed on-base backup power capability. The nature of a globally-networked force where domestic military installations are tied to overseas missions—from drones to cyber operations—means that a power failure at home puts operators abroad at risk. Advanced reactors offer a form of salvation, particularly for critical loads.

Read the full article in The National Interest.

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