Meta is placing a big bet on two energy technologies that sound more like science fiction than utility planning: solar power beamed from space and ultra-long-duration storage built to hold renewable energy for days. In a new announcement published today, the company said it is partnering with Overview Energy and Noon Energy to help support its AI infrastructure and data center operations with more reliable power.
The message behind the announcement is straightforward: AI is hungry for electricity, and the clean-energy systems powering today’s grid still have limits. Solar generation stops when the sun goes down, wind output changes with the weather, and storage remains one of the hardest parts of building a more flexible energy system. Meta said the two partnerships are designed to tackle those problems from opposite directions, one by expanding generation and the other by extending storage.
Implementing Broader Energy Strategy
Overview Energy’s approach is the more futuristic of the two. The company plans to place satellites in geosynchronous orbit about 22,000 miles above Earth, where sunlight is constant, collect energy in space and send it back to Earth-based solar facilities as low-intensity near-infrared light. Those solar farms would then convert the beam into electricity and feed it into the grid, using infrastructure that already exists rather than requiring entirely new land or transmission buildouts. Meta said the arrangement would allow it to deploy up to 1 gigawatt of orbit-to-grid energy and made the company one of the first major technology firms to secure a capacity reservation for space solar energy.
The appeal of that model is obvious. Existing solar farms often sit idle after sunset, but if space-based solar transmission works at scale, those facilities could keep producing power around the clock. Meta said the idea is not just to add more generation, but to get more out of the renewable assets already in place. The company added that Overview’s orbital demonstration is planned for 2028, with commercial delivery to the U.S. grid potentially beginning as early as 2030 if the test succeeds.
The Noon Energy partnership takes a different route. Instead of generating new electricity, it focuses on keeping clean power available far longer than conventional batteries can. Meta said Noon’s technology uses modular, reversible solid oxide fuel cells and carbon-based storage to provide more than 100 hours of energy storage, well beyond what today’s lithium-ion systems can typically handle. Under the agreement, Meta has reserved up to 1 gigawatt and 100 gigawatt-hours of ultra-long-duration storage capacity, with an initial 25 megawatt and 2.5 gigawatt-hour pilot project expected to be completed in 2028.
That scale makes the agreement notable even before the technology is deployed. Meta described it as one of the largest commitments to ultra-long-duration storage in the industry, arguing that storage of this kind could strengthen grid resilience and support baseload power for AI infrastructure day and night. In practical terms, that means a better chance of keeping data centers online with cleaner electricity even when the renewable supply fluctuates.
Building Infrastructure for AI Economy
The company framed both deals as part of a broader energy strategy rather than one-off experiments. Meta said it has already contracted more than 30 gigawatts of clean and renewable energy, representing billions of dollars in capital investment, and pointed to ongoing work with Sage Geosystems and XGS Energy on next-generation geothermal power. It also said it is among the largest corporate buyers of nuclear energy in U.S. history, supporting 7.7 gigawatts across agreements with Vistra, TerraPower, Oklo and Constellation Energy.
Taken together, the new partnerships underline how aggressively Big Tech is moving to secure future energy supply. For Meta, the goal is not only to match the rising power demands of AI, but to do so in a way that helps modernize the grid itself. The company’s argument is that the energy transition will need more than familiar tools like solar panels and batteries; it will also require technologies that push beyond current limits and make existing infrastructure work harder.
Both technologies are still early, and both face obvious technical and commercial hurdles. But that is exactly why Meta says it is backing them now. The company’s view is that the energy system needed for tomorrow’s AI economy will not be built by waiting for mature solutions alone. It will also depend on supporting the ideas that could change what clean power is capable of delivering.
Source: https://blockchainreporter.net/meta-taps-overview-energy-and-noon-energy-in-bid-to-strengthen-grid-for-ai/
