Energy Northwest Cascade SMR: 320 MWe Phase, NRC Filing Slips to 2027

Energy Northwest's Cascade Advanced Energy Facility, the first project under Amazon's X-energy collaboration, has a first phase of 320 MWe, and X-energy now expects to submit its NRC construction permit application in the first half of 2027, as Amazon reports third-quarter results on Oct. 29, 2026.

That filing date has moved. X-energy's April 27, 2026 prospectus targeted the construction permit application for the Cascade Advanced Energy Facility by the end of 2026. On the company's second-quarter call in August, chief executive Clay Sell said it now expects to submit it in the first half of 2027, ANS Nuclear Newswire reported. The project sits beside Energy Northwest's Columbia Generating Station, a 1.2 GWe plant in Richland, Washington.

Cascade is the first new-build reactor project in Amazon's X-energy program. What Amazon holds today is a funded development program and a right to buy the output of four reactors, not a signed power contract with a price. Every date between now and first power is a target, and the earliest of them has already moved from end-2026 to the first half of 2027.

How the Xe-100 Reactors at Cascade Work

Cascade will use X-energy's Xe-100, a high-temperature gas-cooled reactor. Helium carries heat out of a core of TRISO fuel pebbles, in which each uranium kernel sits inside carbon and silicon carbide layers that hold fission products at very high temperatures. Each module is designed to generate 80 MWe of electricity or 200 MWt of heat, X-energy's 10-Q says, and Energy Northwest quotes the same 80 MWe; both are design figures. Four modules form the standard 320 MWe plant.

The full site plan, shown in Amazon's October 2025 images, is three blocks of four modules, up to 960 MW in all. Only the first block carries Amazon's purchase right. No commercial Xe-100 has been delivered, X-energy says; its 10-Q expects the first in the early 2030s, for Dow. X-energy's first deployment is Dow's Long Mott project in Texas, which still awaits its construction permit, and X-energy says it will fit Cascade's site-specific design once it finalizes the Dow design. As of the prospectus, Cascade was at the conceptual site design stage.

Amazon's Funding and Purchase Right at Cascade

The 2024 contract is a Carbon Free Development and Funding Agreement between Amazon and Energy Northwest, according to X-energy's filings. Amazon funds the feasibility, environmental, safety, licensing and risk work, and it has the right to purchase electricity from the first four modules. Amazon also made a direct investment in the project; no amount has been disclosed. No power price, term or cost estimate has been published, and no final investment decision has been announced.

The other eight modules are an option held by Energy Northwest, a public power agency of 29 member utilities. That power would be offered to Amazon and northwest utilities, and public power utilities may buy up to 50% of the output of the full 960 MWe project, the prospectus says.

Amazon's wider ties to X-energy are a separate layer. It made an equity investment in X-energy in 2024, and its options for more than 5 GWe of new Xe-100 projects by 2039 are a target, not capacity under contract. X-energy gave Amazon first-priority allocation of its Xe-100 manufacturing queue slots across 2031 to 2039, which Amazon can allocate to utilities and independent power producers that will own and operate the plants; the prospectus states that Amazon is not obligated to purchase. Washington state gave Energy Northwest $25.0 million to support its application to the DOE Loan Programs Office, the filing says; an application is not a loan.

Energy Northwest said in October 2025 it was negotiating with Cascade Nuclear Partners, an equal joint venture of Kiewit Nuclear Solutions, Black & Veatch and Aecon, to design and build the first four units under a progressive design-build model. That phase sets scope, schedule and cost before full execution. The sources read do not confirm a signed contract.

NRC Licensing Timeline and the Slipped Filing Date

No application has been filed. On the NRC's two-step path, Energy Northwest needs an NRC construction permit to build and a separate operating licence to run the plant; X-energy expects Energy Northwest, as the customer, to apply for the latter later. The prospectus timeline ran: application by end-2026, permit in 2028, site construction in the first half of 2028, commercial operation in the early 2030s. Only the application date has been publicly reset in the sources read. X-energy's second-quarter 10-Q still expects the reactors to begin operating in the early 2030s, and Energy Northwest says construction is anticipated to begin by the end of the decade.

Long Mott sets the precedent. Sell said, per ANS, that a permit decision is likely in the first half of 2027, while X-energy's 10-Q expects receipt of the construction permit in the first quarter of 2027, as covered in Voltgrid's Long Mott project file. Fuel is the other gate: in February 2026 the NRC issued a Special Nuclear Material License for X-energy's TX-1 TRISO-X fuel plant in Oak Ridge, Tennessee; X-energy says construction began in October 2024 and completion is expected by the first half of 2028, so the plant is licensed but not built. X-energy announced a definitive enrichment services agreement with Centrus Energy on Aug. 6, 2026, its 10-Q says, and Sell also cited a long-term agreement with General Matter, per ANS.

What Cascade Means for Amazon's Power Supply

Cascade is the first project under the X-energy program; Amazon calls Indiana the second. The Indiana plan is at an earlier, feasibility stage, as Voltgrid reported in its Indiana Xe-100 project file. In Voltgrid's reading, Cascade is the first place Amazon's X-energy program could turn into power, since Indiana uses the same reactor design and is at an earlier stage; no source says Cascade's licensing sets the program's pace.

No source ties Cascade's output to a named Amazon or AWS campus or to a direct line. Amazon framed the 2024 deal as net-new carbon-free energy for the grid. The 320 MWe right covers four modules; anything beyond that depends on Energy Northwest exercising its option and on other buyers.

What to Watch Next

The Long Mott permit decision, which Sell put in the first half of 2027, is the first test for the Xe-100. Cascade's own application is targeted for the same half-year, and its date has already moved once. After that come a signed design-build contract, a disclosed power price, financing and a final investment decision, none of them dated. Remarks on Amazon's Oct. 29 call, if any, would be the next sign of how Amazon ranks the project.