Three Mile Island Reopens to Power Microsoft AI & 'Cards Against Humanity' Sues SpaceX

0:00Tuesday on NBC, Jimmy Fallon and Bozma St John host the highly anticipated new competition show. I hired 10 creatives from all walks of life. They will be battling it out to see who can impress the world's biggest brands. This is a huge opportunity. This is the battle for the next big idea. This is not play play. We're spending millions of dollars. I'm so excited to embark on this adventure with all of you. Make the best idea win! On Brand with Jimmy Fallon. Series premiere Tuesday on NBC. Good morning, Brew Daily Show. I'm Neil Freiman. And I'm Toby Howell. Today, how Intel went from the largest chipmaker in the world to a takeover target.

0:39Then AI has gone nuclear. Why Microsoft is backing a plan to recommission the power plant at Three Mile Island. It's Monday, September 23rd. Let's ride.

0:55Toby, I see you're rocking your red fleece, which can only mean one thing. Fall is here. The official first day of fall or autumn, if you think you're better than us. Began yesterday, and if you're not prepared to get cozy, you need to order that Teakwood Candle ASAP. So, obviously, I started looking up fun facts about fall this morning, and I learned the etymology of the word autumn and fall, why there are increased marital engagements during the fall months, and what the number one pumpkin-growing state is in the U.S. So, Neil, choose your own adventure. What do you want the people to learn about on this, the autumnal equinox?

1:31I think let's go B, the marital engagements. Why do those spike? It's kind of exactly what you think Thanksgiving is in the fall. And that time of bringing a lot of family together just leads to maybe some pressure to get engaged. So it really is just that there are more family gatherings during the fall months. All right, can we get a bonus? What's the biggest pumpkin growing state? It's Illinois, which I never would have guessed, which I think is why they call it a fun fact. Now let's take a moment to hear from our sponsor, Wise Business, the app for doing things in other currencies. Neil, I got this message from a listener the other day, and get this.

2:08They're launching Podsocks, custom socks for all the podcast lovers out there. I've heard a lot of ideas come out of your mouth before, but Podsocks is one of the weirdest. Hey, have a little faith. I think this thing could go global. Well, it can go global as long as they use Wise. The Podsocks teams can pay its employees, suppliers, or contractors in multiple currencies. No stress, no hidden fees, and no markups on exchange rates. Keep going. I'm writing all of this down. Wait, I thought you said you got this idea from a listener. Yeah, I did. I just so happen to be the listener. And I'll tell you what, Let's Ride hits differently the second time around.

2:43Oh, boy. Just let me know when Podsocks starts to ship. Oh, now he's interested. If you're ready to go global with your business, socks or otherwise, head to wise.com slash business. That's wise.com slash business. Eczema isn't always obvious, but it's real. and so is the relief from EBCLIS. After an initial dosing phase, about four in 10 people taking EBCLIS achieved itch relief and clear or almost clear skin at 16 weeks. And most of those people maintain skin that's still more clear at one year with monthly dosing. EBCLIS, LibriKizumab, LBKZ, a 250 milligram per two milliliter injection is a prescription medicine used to treat adults and children 12 years of age and older who weigh at least 88 pounds or 40 kilograms with moderate to severe eczema.

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3:57Three Mile Island was the site of the worst commercial nuclear accident in U.S. history, but the Pennsylvania power plant is officially coming back online to help a single company power its AI ambitions. Microsoft will be the sole customer of the resurrected plant that was the site of a partial nuclear meltdown in 1979, signing a 20-year deal with its owner, Constellation Energy, to purchase power from it. It is a big win for the nuclear industry that is going through its we are so back moment. Data centers serving the AI boom are the hungry, hungry hippos of the energy world. So companies like Microsoft need more power to come online.

4:36And despite the bad rap it's attracted in recent decades, nuclear still represents a 24-7 environmentally friendly option to meet that demand. And clearly the economics of the arrangement with Microsoft makes sense since Constellation is spending$1.6 billion to relaunch the reactor after it was decommissioned five years ago for financial reasons. Three Mile Island is set to become operational again by 2028. Does this mean nuclear is back, Neil? There are a couple of firsts here. First of all, this is the first U.S. nuclear plant to come back into service after being decommissioned or what they call mothballed.

5:12And then never before has the entire output of a commercial nuclear power plant been allocated to a single customer. You're right. The nuclear power industry was on its way out, essentially. Between 2012 and 2022, electric utilities in the U.S. closed 13 reactors and a bunch of other ones were kind of in their golden years, just winding things down. And then all of a sudden, November 2022, ChatGPT came along and there was this arms race to develop chatbots and AI systems. And all these tech companies need so much energy. At the same time that they need energy, they have all these emissions goals to hit.

5:53So they're scouring the globe for possible sources of power and clean power. And they're going to places like Three Mile Island, which has such a stigma in American history and saying, yep, boot that back up because we need you. I don't think a lot of people realize either that Three Mile Island was actually operational as recently as 2019. It was creating was producing power there, but it closed for financial reasons. But you're right. The financial calculus of operating a nuclear energy power plant totally shifted with the demands that AI is putting on the power grid. One aspect of this deal that is interesting is the government aid that will flow to Consolation Energy.

6:34They will be eligible for federal tax credits from the Inflation Reduction Act for the power it's producing. But that is a little controversial because those tax breaks are crucial to making this deal economically feasible. But you could make an argument that data centers are straining or you could make the argument that should they be eligible for these tax credits if the power is going to a single customer in Microsoft? Because is that really benefiting the community if just one single entity is purchasing the entire power output from this? That being said, though, you could make the argument that data centers are straining power supplies across the nation.

7:13So by removing some of Microsoft's power-hungry needs from the grid at large, it is benefiting the community. So I've seen both sides here. But it is just an interesting thing to look at is how government money is flowing into this project. Yeah, it does seem to be playing a big part because this project is going to cost Constellation$1.6 billion. In general, the amount of pressure that AI is putting on the power grid and just these data centers in general is quite stunning. So currently, data centers account for 3 % of all U.S. power needs. In just 2030, which is, what, five, four, six years from now, that is expected to more than double, according to Goldman Sachs, to 8 % of U.S.

7:57power. And then around the world, AI is expected to make up 0.5 % of all worldwide electricity use in just three years. That's roughly what Argentina uses in a year. So you might see more of these deals coming into the fore. Amazon signed a deal with Talent Energy, which operates a nuclear plant also in Pennsylvania. You have Bill Gates, who's starting up this modular nuclear reactor startup in Wyoming. In California, they reversed the decision to shut down the Diablo Canyon plant. And then in western Michigan, there's this project called Palisades Nuclear Plant, which was decommissioned in 2022.

8:33And they're looking at bringing that online again. So a pretty stunning reversal for the nuclear industry. And I just want to point out about Three Mile Island. They have two reactors. One is the one that melted down. That is not coming, partially melted down. That one is not coming back online. The other one, which didn't have a malfunction and just closed for economic reasons in 2019, is the one that Microsoft will be using. So we're going to watch this project closely and it might be replicated across the country. The saga of Intel just had an M. Night Shyamalan-worthy plot twist when multiple outlets reported on Friday that it was the subject of a takeover attempt by Qualcomm.

9:09If a deal happens, and that is a major if, it would be one of the biggest acquisitions of all time and represent a stunning downfall for what was, at one point, the largest chipmaker in the world. Listeners of MBD know all about Intel's recent struggles. It's getting lapped by Asian chipmakers. It completely missed the boat on the AI boom. And its stock price has been cutting more than half this year alone. The challenges it's facing are some of the greatest in its legendary 56-year history. Into this dumpster fire steps Qualcomm, the San Diego-based tech giant that makes the chips that power your smartphone.

9:44Unlike Intel, Qualcomm is on a heater this year, with its stock popping more than 50 % to give it a market cap of nearly$200 billion. Despite Intel's struggles, Qualcomm thinks there's a lot to like about the company that literally put the silicon in Silicon Valley. So, how much would Qualcomm need to pay for Intel? Well, Intel's market value is right now at$93 billion, which probably means a takeover would reach well into the$100 billion range. Toby, thoughts on this potential blockbuster deal? It would be a blockbuster. It comes down to a couple of things. One, antitrust regulators will definitely be looking at this because you would be combining two of the biggest chipmakers in the United States.

10:25But also, it's kind of a pride thing for Intel as well because it used to be the largest chipmaker in the world, but now it's had this stunning fall from grace. It has been just a tough time for Intel. They've been trying to kind of separate parts of their company into their chip design and their chip manufacturing. Their chip design is going okay, but their chip manufacturing is money-losing at the current moment. So its manufacturing arm just kind of stinks when you compare it to the rest of the world. So I do think that potentially you could see this as an opportunity to strengthen the U.S.'s competitive edge in the chip making business.

11:03Or you could see it as this big sticking point for antitrust regulators that these are two behemoths. We do not want them to combine forces here. Right. There is a national security component here because the U.S. has spent all this money trying to bring chip makers to start producing domestically because of how critical chips are into military and other applications that are very sensitive. You mentioned that Intel has multiple things going on. So if you look at the chip world, I know it's pretty confusing. There's a lot of chip makers from NVIDIA to TSMC to Samsung to Qualcomm. Most of them separate into two camps.

11:41You have the chip designers, which is NVIDIA. So think of NVIDIA as a company that designs chips and makes chips, but does not actually manufacturing them. They source them to what are called foundries like TSMC in Taiwan. And then you have TSMC, Samsung. Those are essentially contract manufacturers. They are called foundries, and they make chips. They take orders from companies like NVIDIA and make chips. The thing about Intel, it does both. It designs chips and makes them. So it's got its hands in a lot of different areas here. And that is very expensive, especially the manufacturing part. So let's take a look at these two businesses.

12:21Intel spent$26 billion on CapEx last year, which was nearly 50 % of its entire revenue. That's because it has to build these huge fabs to make chips. Qualcomm's capital spending last fiscal year was$1.5 billion, just over 4 % of its sales. So when you're looking at the various business models here, you see Qualcomm spending 4 % on CapEx and Intel on 48%. Maybe that's one reason why Qualcomm has just leapt ahead of Intel in this race. Also, Qualcomm is licking its chops here because it mainly focuses on supplying chips to smartphones. A lot of Apple's devices run on Qualcomm chips. It is a critical supplier for Apple's iPhones.

12:59But if this deal happens, it would absolutely broaden Qualcomm's kind of horizons. It would not just be a mobile phone chip making business. Intel mostly makes chips that you find in personal computers, in servers. So they are definitely looking at this saying like, all right, this is our chance here. We're going to approach it with a friendly takeover. This same thing, by the way, happened to Qualcomm a few years ago where Broadcom tried to bid$117 billion in 2017. And that was when I was saying it's kind of a pride thing because at the time, Qualcomm was like, absolutely not. We think we are not a takeover target.

13:34So to have Intel kind of be on the auction block almost or just having these talks happen whatsoever just shows the fall from grace that Intel has recently had. in a headline that sounds like it is straight out of a game of cards against humanity cards against humanity is suing elon musk over alleged trespassing in texas yes the adult party game is going toe to toe with the richest man in the world because it bought land near the mexican border way back in 2017 as a joke to stop then president trump's border wall and it still owns it to this day. According to the suit, SpaceX has been trespassing on and damaging the plot of vacant land by turning it into a work site and destroying vegetation over the past six months.

14:20The company said that before SpaceX arrived, the land was a place where wild horses galloped freely in the Texas moonlight and spun up a website to show before and after pics of what SpaceX has done. Despite the humorous approach, Cards Against Humanity is asking for$15 million in damages that it plans to redistribute to the people who crowdfunded the original purchase of the land. This is a real headache for Elon in SpaceX, Neil. Yeah, I mean, this speaks to what SpaceX has been doing in a very remote tip of southern Texas. I don't think Cards Against Humanity, they were trying to go toe-to-toe with Trump back in 2017.

14:57I don't think they had any idea that Elon Musk would come into the picture, but he's built out this massive development called Starbase near Brownsville, Texas, which is near the Mexican border. That's where they launched Starship. They've poured 2 ,100 jobs, billions of dollars into investment in the region, and they're just gobbling up all of the land, and there's been tension with neighbors. And that is how Cards Against Humanity actually found out about it because a local guy there saw that they were moving gravel and basically setting up this staging area on a parcel of land, and he was like, what's going on here?

15:27So he called up SpaceX, didn't get a response, and then he called up, I guess he found out Cards Against Humanity owns this parcel. So he called them up and then I guess that alerted Cards Against Humanity to what was going on there. And they, this company, which started on Kickstarter, by the way, has done a bunch of stunts before. So this is nothing new to them, but they are certainly relishing this fight with Elon Musk. They must be thanking their lucky stars because you're right. Originally, the plan was to go against Donald Trump, but now they have this other billionaire that is knocking on their door trying to use their land.

16:01And they must have said, what great fortune for this. we can make a very big deal out of this. They have spun up a website called elonowsyou100.com where they kind of lay out their big vision and mission for pushing back against Elon Musk. If they win, each person would get, each of the original donors would get around$100, which is a 700 % ROI on the property because most of the people originally donated$15 in the crowdfunding effort. So it is tongue in cheek, but also at the same time, they do own the land. And so I don't think this is going away anytime soon, especially because they can milk this for the publicity.

16:38Totally. We're talking about it right now. Speaking of headaches for Elon, he has another headache that he's been contending with in Brazil. Remember, he made this big stink about a judge asking him to remove some accounts and appoint a local legal representative to handle future requests relating to his social media company X. Elon said no. He called the judge a tyrant. But then Brazil responded by blocking X in the country. And for three weeks, everyone's been kind of wondering who's going to blink first here. And it turns out Elon Musk blinked first. X agreed to appoint that legal representative in Brazil to pay their fines and to remove the accounts ordered by the court.

17:15Brazil is simply just too big a market for X, 40 million monthly users. So I think Elon Musk saw everyone was kind of fleeing to other social media platforms and said, all right, we'll give in to your request. So that was the other kind of headache Elon was dealing with over the weekend. And it looks like Brazil came out on top of that little tiff. Up next, it's Monday, which means you got our winners of the weekend coming your way. I'm Christian McCaffrey, pro running back. And Abercrombie is an official fashion partner of the NFL. I'm not kidding when I say NFL by Abercrombie broke the internet last year.

17:50And I think this season's lineup is even cooler. and so does my wife who keeps stealing all my hoodies. Stay fit for the season and Abercrombie's newest arrivals. Shop NFL by Abercrombie in the app, online, and in store.

18:12When did making plans get this complicated? It's time to streamline with WhatsApp, the secure messaging app that brings the whole group together. Use polls to settle dinner plans. Send event invites and pin messages so no one forgets mom's 60th. And never miss a meme or milestone. All protected with end-to-end encryption. It's time for WhatsApp. Message privately with everyone. Learn more at whatsapp.com. Welcome to our winners of the weekend, the segment where Toby and I picked two things that had a weekend worth bragging about on LinkedIn. I won the pre-show fitted sheet folding contest, so I get to go first.

18:52And my winner is the WNBA. The playoffs started yesterday, capping a record-smashing regular season that could prove transformative for the league and signal a new era for women's professional sports. Coming into the 2024 season, expectations were through the roof for the potential business boost provided by Iowa's Kaitlin Clark, LSU's Angel Reese, and the rest of a star-studded rookie cast. Well, we can confidently say it lived up to the hype and more. It was the most viewed WNBA regular season in its 27-year history. Much of the growth did come from the Caitlin Clark effect with her games for the Indiana Fever, drawing huge TV ratings and selling out arenas around the country.

19:33Get this, 21 of the 24 WNBA broadcasts that topped 1 million viewers this season featured Clark. Not a single WNBA broadcast had reached 1 million viewers since 2008, and there were 24 this year. Meanwhile, average attendance at Fever Games in Indianapolis was a league record 17 ,035, which is a 319 % jump from a little over 4 ,000 this last year. To no one's surprise, Clark was unanimously awarded Rookie of the Year yesterday. But Toby, this season wasn't all the Caitlin Clark show. There were big jumps across the board. Yeah, it was definitely a rising tide floats all boats sort of thing. ESPN said TV audiences for all WNBA regular season games were up 170 % over last year.

20:17attendance for every single team grew by double digits. Indiana Fever did lead the pack with a 319 % increase, but you literally saw every single team in the league at least see a double-digit growth in their attendance. League-wide attendance was the highest it's been since 1999. And the best part is it is starting to translate into money as well. Remember in July, the WNBA signed this big 11-year media rights deal worth$2.2 billion, goes into effect 2026. recently the contract triples the yearly payout so it was making 60 million dollars over its previous media rights deal now it's bringing in over 200 million dollars which should translate to higher salaries so you are right caitlin clark did change the game but everywhere across the league you're seeing more money flow in and more eyeballs uh paid attention to these teams right and shout out to adra wilson who won the mvp the only the second unanimous pick for mvp uh yeah the Playoffs started yesterday.

21:13I don't know how much longer we're going to see Kaitlin Clark, to be honest, because the fever got kind of trounced. I know. We were looking at each other this morning saying, ah, it's a bit tough. We're doing this story. And the Connecticut Sun absolutely blew the fever out. So it's a best of three series, though, so they do have two more games. And it should be a good playoffs no matter what. Yeah, no matter what. My winner of the weekend is movie theaters because they are getting a Miss Congeniality-level makeover, an industry group called National Association of Theater Owners that represents the eight largest theater chains like AMC and Cinemark announced a$2.2 billion plan to spruce up nearly 21 ,000 screens across North America to make the theater experience more appealing to customers.

21:53With so much content available through streaming services these days, the group decided they need to get their act together to convince viewers to leave their comfy couches and shell out cash to go to the movies. Some of the big improvements include better projection and sound systems, tastier concessions, and adding non-movie entertainment options like bowling alleys to some theaters. But the plan also zeroed in on the small details of the movie experience, like improving air conditioning, creating new signage, and even putting in different carpeting. Neil, we all know the movie industry has been going through it.

22:26Is new carpet the way to get out of this slump? I think it's better than zip lines and they're saying they're putting in pickleball courts and bowling alleys that are somewhat adjacent to movie theaters. I think that people want to go to the movies to go to the movies. So putting in better screens, better air conditioning, better carpets, better concessions, just making that experience better is probably a little bit more effective than all these side quests that a lot of the theater chains are doing with dinner and all these other recreational options. But this is, I think, a bullish sign for movie theaters.

23:01The past five years have been absolutely insane for them. There was COVID, which they got absolutely wrecked during. And then last year was that last summer was the strikes. And now finally, I think they're coming out of that emergency mode and finally thinking about the future for the first time. They're saying people stuck with us throughout this whole time. They could have left. Movie theaters could have died. But right now we're still making money. There have been a few billion dollar movies this year. Inside Out 2. Deadpool and Wolverine did really well. Twisters did really well. So they're saying, oh, people still want to come to movies.

23:32After all this happened, it's time to put our foot on the gas pedal and really rev up here. I do think, too, you mentioned kind of increasing the projections and the sound quality. All you have to do is look at the success of IMAX recently to show that people do want something different than what their experience is at home. And usually that means just a really big screen, really high fidelity audio, really high hi-fi videography as well. IMAX's annual box axe revenue reached over a billion dollars last year. Remember, we talked about it with Oppenheimer. A big chunk of their opening weekend sales came from IMAX screens.

24:10Ticket sales for premium formats accounted for 14 percent of all box office sales dating back to June 2024. so it does seem like people do want that experience that kind of blows them away so maybe it's not pickleball as much as i do love pickleball it is just a bigger and better movie screen that will get people to the movies and comfy chairs and comfy chairs it's monday so here is a rundown of the major events to know about for the week ahead the annual un general assembly begins today in new york city with 140 leaders from around the world coming to town to solve the world's problems or at least try.