Demand for electricity is soaring, and the U.S. wants nuclear energy to fill this need. By 2050, the government wants nuclear power capacity to grow from 100 gigawatts to 400 gigawatts, which would make up a huge portion of electricity demand even when including the robust growth from artificial intelligence (AI) data centers.
One company has a new (and approved) nuclear reactor design hoping to disrupt the market: NuScale Power (SMR -3.37%). The company believes it has a small and scalable nuclear reactor design that can be the backbone of the growth in nuclear power over the next few decades. Its stock has soared and is up 300% in the last year, with its market cap now over $10 billion.
Where will NuScale Power stock be in five years?
The first approved small modular reactor design
Ahead of the pack, NuScale Power has the only design for a small modular reactor (SMR) that has been approved by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). This SMR technology is scalable, hence the modular name, with the ability to connect multiple reactors together for different project needs. In 2020, NuScale received its first approval from the NRC, with further approvals in the last few years for different design types.
Each SMR has the capacity to generate 77 megawatts of power. If adoption for these designs take hold, NuScale could end up selling dozens of reactors a year to help fulfill the planned need for increased electricity generation. This could mean hundreds of millions -- if not billions -- in annual revenue from reactor sales and maintenance contracts.
But it is all theoretical today. The company has never actually built a nuclear reactor.
Image source: Getty Images.
No announced projects
NuScale Power's SMR design has been approved for years now. So why doesn't it have any projects in the pipeline? This would be a good question for investors to ask. NuScale is currently exploring a reactor project with a Romanian utility called RoPower, which is generating a negligible amount of revenue for the SMR builder.
However, RoPower has still not committed to using a NuScale reactor. This should be a flashing warning sign for the viability of the company's business. In fact, NuScale Power did have a project in place in Utah that was canceled in late 2023. Delays and cost overruns made the project uneconomical, so the Utah utility canceled its plans with NuScale Power.
Today, NuScale doesn't have a single customer to speak of, likely because potential buyers looking at the Utah project are worried about similar cost overruns affecting their plans. If NuScale Power cannot win any contracts, it will mean no revenue -- let alone profits.
SMR Shares Outstanding data by YCharts.
Where will NuScale Power stock be in 5 years?
The last year has been kind to NuScale Power shareholders. The stock now has a market capitalization of $10.3 billion, with share dilution coming down the line that will further inflate this market valuation. But a market cap of over $10 billion makes zero sense for a company that generates zero revenue. This is especially true when NuScale has an approved reactor design but is not winning any contracts to build one.
NuScale Power and other nuclear energy stocks talk a big game. But they don't have much in the way of financial performance (well, they have none, actually). Five years from now, the stock is likely to be much lower than it is today. This is a pre-revenue start-up at an inflated valuation with no proven way to generate revenue, let alone a profit.
