Port of Long Beach advances nuclear site evaluation as California weighs first new reactors in 50 years
A port authority proposal to host advanced reactors tests whether California can build new nuclear capacity for the first time since the 1970s.
The Port of Long Beach board has advanced a proposal to host new nuclear power generation, opening the door for California's first new atomic reactors in roughly 50 years. The San Bernardino Sun reported the port authority is evaluating the site for advanced reactor deployment, a move that would place baseload power directly inside the state's largest load center.5
California power markets have spent two decades shedding nuclear capacity while load growth from data centers and electrification accelerates. The state has not ordered new nuclear construction since the 1970s. Putting new capacity at Long Beach would bypass some transmission constraints that have plagued renewable buildout.5
The Long Beach proposal follows a wave of state-level policy reversals. New Jersey on a Wednesday (2026-04-08) morning became the sixth state in the last decade, and the second that year, to fully repeal its moratorium on new nuclear construction. That law targets a minimum of 1,100 MW from next-generation reactors.2,6
California's own moratorium technically remains on the books, though the Long Beach effort suggests developers are looking for a path around it. A project there would face a separate set of approvals from the California Public Utilities Commission and the California Energy Commission, and the California Coastal Commission would likely have jurisdiction over any reactor within the port's footprint — a layer of review that no restart project has yet had to navigate.5
The economics remain contested. Advanced reactor designs, including small modular reactors, carry higher upfront costs per megawatt than utility-scale solar or wind, but they offer capacity factors above 90 percent. California's evening peak, driven by air conditioning and the so-called duck curve, has pushed prices at state trading hubs well above the national average, which strengthens the case for dispatchable generation.6
Proponents point to restart momentum elsewhere. Google inked a deal last October with NextEra to fund the restart of Iowa's Duane Arnold plant, which shut down in 2020, with power expected by early 2029. Palisades in Michigan is also moving toward restart, with electricity targeted for next year. Those restarts are cheaper than new builds, but they demonstrate that utilities and large buyers are willing to pay for firm power.5
Waste disposal is the unresolved piece. California Rep. Mike Levin said the nuclear fuel announcement was a long time coming and required bipartisan collaboration to fix difficult nuclear waste challenges. Five states have offered to accept nuclear waste in exchange for help developing nuclear energy, a shift that could ease the storage question historically blocking new builds in the state.7
The global backdrop has moved in nuclear's favor. China's nuclear generation capacity rose 76 percent — 24 GW — between 2016 and 2024, according to EIA International Energy Statistics data. The IAEA's Power Reactor Information System shows China added a further 1.1 GW in 2025 and 2.2 GW through May 2026, with 36 reactors under construction accounting for more than 49 percent of world nuclear construction. As of May 2026, China had 60 operational reactors with 58.7 GW of installed capacity across 18 sites.3
Japan is wrestling with its own version of the same question. Fifteen years after Fukushima, the country is considering restarting Kashiwazaki-Kariwa, the world's largest nuclear plant. Japan's latest energy plan foresees renewables providing between 40 and 50 percent of electricity by 2040, up from around 25 percent recently, but researchers from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory estimate renewables could reliably reach 70 percent by 2035 — a range wide enough to leave nuclear's role genuinely unclear.1
California is arguably the hardest test case. The state has the most aggressive renewable mandates in the country, and its grid operator has added battery storage to manage the evening peak — REV Renewables commissioned its Tumbleweed Energy Storage facility in Kern County on June 18. But batteries discharge for four hours. A multi-day heat event or supply disruption is a different problem.4
The Long Beach site carries specific risks beyond the regulatory stack. It sits in a seismic zone, handles major shipping traffic, and abuts dense residential neighborhoods. Developers have not filed a formal application. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission's advanced reactor licensing process, which the agency has been modernizing for small modular designs, still requires years of review before a construction permit can issue.5
The California Energy Commission's next integrated resource plan, due later this year, will be the first concrete signal. Inclusion of the Long Beach site would indicate regulators treat the proposal as a live option. Absence would suggest the state intends to rely on batteries and imports to cover its evening peak for another full planning cycle.5