Nuclear could replace wind power at Lava Ridge site in Idaho

• Sawtooth Energy and Development, an independently owned energy developer in Idaho, plans to build a 462-MW nuclear power plant in southern Idaho, according to local news reports and a draft environmental impact statement.
• The plant would take shape on public land previously earmarked for LS Power’s 1-GW Lava Ridge wind farm and use an Idaho Power substation that would have connected its turbines to the Western U.S. grid. President Trump halted Lava Ridge on his first day in office.
• Dan Adamson, project manager for Sawtooth, told Idaho News 6 that LS Power’s predevelopment work, President Trump’s recent nuclear executive orders and the federal budget bill Trump signed on July 4 could reduce the project’s development timeline from five years to about two years.

Midpoint Small Modular Reactor Project #1 would use six 77-MW NuScale VOYGR modules to produce an electric output of 462 MW, according to the draft EIS dated July 31, 2025, and posted on Sawtooth’s website.

The plant would occupy a 320-acre Bureau of Land Management site about 15 miles northeast of Jerome, Idaho, near Idaho Power’s Midpoint substation, the EIS says. The substation connects transmission lines running east-west through Idaho and southwest into Nevada.

Sawtooth has not yet filed an interconnection request with Idaho Power and the utility is not directly involved in the project, an Idaho Power spokesperson told local newspaper the Times-News earlier this week. Adamson told the outlet that Sawtooth is working on the interconnection request and that he expects the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to approve the project’s environmental study “very, very soon.”

Before construction can begin, the project also needs a construction permit or combined operating license from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. NRC’s website shows no active applications for the site.

NuScale says it has designated ENTRA1 Energy as its “exclusive global partner for the commercialization, distribution and deployment of our SMR technology.” Under the arrangement, ENTRA1 “develops, finances, owns and operates” plants powered by NuScale modules.

In a written statement Wednesday, a NuScale representative distanced the company from Sawtooth.

“Currently, we are not engaged with Sawtooth Energy and Development Corp., nor have we authorized them to make any public statements regarding NuScale Power,” the statement read. “NuScale remains committed to working with our exclusive partner, ENTRA1, to commercialize, deploy, and distribute the only NRC-approved SMR technology.”

In a Friday email, Adamson said that Sawtooth had not engaged with ENTRA1. However, the company has “talked with NuScale and [we] like their equipment and design, but [has] no written deal as of yet.”

Sawtooth expects to deliver its draft environmental impact statement to the NRC by late August and begin the NRC licensing process sometime after that, he added.

In May, NRC approved NuScale’s updated design for the US460 plant, the same six-module configuration Sawtooth says it will build. That “standard design certification” could accelerate the review process once an application is filed.

Should it reach operation, Midpoint would become the first commercial U.S. power plant using NuScale’s pressurized water reactor technology. The company previously had an agreement with a coalition of Western utilities to deploy a 462-MW power plant at Idaho National Laboratory, but that project fell apart in late 2023 amid rising costs and flagging subscriptions.

More recently, NuScale executives have said they are engaging with hyperscale data center companies and other power-hungry customers. But committed offtake agreements with utility or industrial customers have proven elusive.

NuScale has at least 12 modules in production with Doosan, its South Korea-based manufacturing partner, CEO John Hopkins said on its most recent investor call. The company continues predevelopment work as a subcontractor on a 462-MW Romanian power plant project led by Fluor Corporation that could reach final investment decision next year.

Midpoint would be a significantly more compact alternative to the Lava Ridge project, which would have spanned thousands of acres across three Idaho counties. BLM approved a slimmed-down, 241-turbine version of the proposal in December after years of fierce local opposition.