Datacenter powered by Nuclear at RELLIS?

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BobAchgill
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1:04a, 9/21/25
Concerns About RELLIS, Datacenters, and Nuclear Power

I have questions about plans that Texas A&M, College Station, and Bryan have not fully disclosed regarding datacenters and nuclear power at RELLIS.

Whatever is happening at RELLIS appears to require twice the power of College Station, Bryan, and Texas A&M combined, judging from the scale of power line upgrades being run to the site.

Whenever datacenters and nuclear power generation are involvedas it appears they are, based on limited information, permits being pulled, and infrastructure being built these questions deserve public scrutiny:

What about water?

What about noise?

What about higher energy bills?

What about radioactive leaks?

Why all the secrecy from leaders who are supposed to serve the public?


These entities Bryan, College Station, and Texas A&M have already lost credibility. They withheld the critical fact that BCS water security had been downgraded from 50 years to just 8 to 10 years. That downgrade was hidden from the public from May 2024 until December 2024, conveniently after city elections.

College Station leaders also concealed knowledge for 18 months about a planned datacenter in the middle of a planned residential community. Only after 200+ citizens showed up 170 of whom spoke or submitted complaints combined with a clear threat of recall was the project canceled. Would leaders ever have acted in the public's interest without that pressure?

Public trust is gone. How can city leaders, staff, and Texas A&M leadership justify planning two water-hungry datacenters and nuclear power generation when they knew we were already facing a water security collapse?

Why didn't they disclose the water downgrade to bondholders when selling water infrastructure bonds with maturities longer than 8 years? Was that not material information for lenders? Instead of wasting time on water-hungry projects, leaders should have been aggressively pursuing desalination to secure the region's future.

Is the Aggie Code of Honor no longer enough to prevent us from self-destruction?

Citizens of College Station and Bryan need to give their councils a report card in the form of recall elections. During campaigns, candidates should be required to explain how they will secure desalinated water from the Gulf because without water, the $25 billion value of our homes and businesses will vanish.

The rest of the nation will be watching how Texans respond to this datacenter invasion.

See my research, presented in this video:


Explore the research notebook here:
https://notebooklm.google.com/notebook/1b7d7290-d79d-4292-ab90-e507b5efca25

Hard lessons across the U.S. show how datacenters damage communitiesthrough water use, noise, power demand, falling property values, and safety risks:





https://www.instagram.com/share/BAGEy250zU


Now the question is: Is the RELLIS plan adding nuclear risks exposing Brazos County residents and Texas A&M students to radioactive dangerjust so datacenter and nuclear companies can certify products for nationwide marketing? The public seems to be shouldering all the risk while corporations reap all the benefits.

We deserve real transparency from city councils and from Texas A&M leadership.

If we recall councils, replace city managers, and demand accountability from Texas A&M with the barganing chip of tightening housing occupancy rules if they are not community minded on bringing harmful research to RELLIS. They should cancel contracts for the RELLIS Data Center Nuclear "research" deal. These decisions were made without public input on critical public safety issues.

Bob Achgill
Class of '81, B.S.M.E.
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chigger
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3:22a, 9/21/25
AG
I don't know much about this project, but I can tell you today's nuclear is not the same. It's many, many times safer than what we usually think of when you picture "nuclear". I might have concerns over certain aspects, but I would have no concern over a modern reactor.
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doubledog
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6:55a, 9/21/25
OP read up on the new smaller Thorium-based nuclear power plants. The risks are minimal verses the benefits.

Just a reminder, TAMU has been operating a working fission reactor and cyclotron since 1961 and 1964 respectively, without any incidents.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thorium-based_nuclear_power
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woodiewood1
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In reply to chigger • 7:02a, 9/21/25
chigger said:
I don't know much about this project, but I can tell you today's nuclear is not the same. It's many, many times safer than what we usually think of when you picture "nuclear". I might have concerns over certain aspects, but I would have no concern over a modern reactor.

Yep, there are 94 nuclear reactors in the U.S. 71 nuclear powered subs. and 11 nuclear powered aircraft carriers in our military and the last leak of any significance was in 2010 and many of those have old technology,

There's been one at A&M since 1961 without any major issues that I have even heard of.

Eventually, there will be SMRs located in communities to supply power to each community,
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LOYAL AG
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7:27a, 9/21/25
AG
Lots to unpack here but generally this looks a lot like NIMBY. Data center demand is growing faster than they can be built and those things need power and water. Texas isn't in a great place in terms of water so that's a real area of concern in general but at some point we have to trust the people we hire to make the right decisions. How to power those data centers is another big question but nuclear is easily the best option here. "Exposing the community to potential leaks" is nothing more than fear mongering. As noted already modern nuclear is as safe as anything in the energy space. Texas power demands are growing rapidly and nuclear is an infinitely better option than solar and wind and has to be part of the equation. It's extremely unlikely a town housing Texas A&M is going to be left out of the conversation with regard to data centers so to me it sounds like our elected officials are doing what we hired them to do.
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GSS
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In reply to woodiewood1 • 7:34a, 9/21/25
woodiewood1 said:
Yep, there are 94 nuclear reactors in the U.S. 71 nuclear powered subs. and 11 nuclear powered aircraft carriers in our military and the last leak of any significance was in 2010 and many of those have old technology,

There's been one at A&M since 1961 without any major issues that I have even heard of.

Eventually, there will be SMRs located in communities to supply power to each community,

You cited the number of operating nuclear power plant units, in operation in the US. They average 1000 MW thermal, typically at a 35%-ish electrical output.

The A&M research reactor is 1MW thermal, with zero electrical capability. So while an outstanding research facility, not a valid comparison to what's planned.
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woodiewood1
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In reply to GSS • 8:08a, 9/21/25
GSS said:
woodiewood1 said:
Yep, there are 94 nuclear reactors in the U.S. 71 nuclear powered subs. and 11 nuclear powered aircraft carriers in our military and the last leak of any significance was in 2010 and many of those have old technology,

There's been one at A&M since 1961 without any major issues that I have even heard of.

Eventually, there will be SMRs located in communities to supply power to each community,

You cited the number of operating nuclear power plant units, in operation in the US. They average 1000 MW thermal, typically at a 35%-ish electrical output.

The A&M research reactor is 1MW thermal, with zero electrical capability. So while an outstanding research facility, not a valid comparison to what's planned.

The reference is towards the comments of the potential leaks, Every nuclear power plant could leak, but we have had none of any significance, that I can find, since 2010. Just stating the # that are in operation in the U.S, in any form or capacity,

The 94 commercial nuclear power plants in the U.S. range from about 1000 MW to 4,600 MW.

Texas's two commercial nuclear plantsthe South Texas Project and Comanche Peakgenerate approximately 5,000 to 5,300 megawatts (MW) of power combined, contributing a significant portion of the state's electricity. The South Texas Project provides roughly 2,700 MW, while Comanche Peak adds about 2,300 MW to the state's power supply.


In 2024, commercial nuclear power plants in the U.S. generated nearly 782 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity, and their net summer electricity generation capacity was approximately 95.55 million kilowatts. Nuclear energy accounts for about 19% of the total annual electricity generated in the United States.

List of the largest nuclear power stations in the United States - Wikipedia

"There have been no civilian deaths or direct fatalities due to radiation exposure from commercial nuclear power plant operations in the United States. While there was a fatal industrial accident at the Three Mile Island plant in 1979, it did not involve radiation and was not related to nuclear energy production. "

For me, the volumes of water needed is the key issue as to why most of Texas might not be the best location for data centers. Near the major rivers and Great Lakes might be a much better site location?

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chigger
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11:47a, 9/21/25
AG
I agree the water issue is much more real than the nuclear one.
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woodiewood1
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In reply to chigger • 11:56a, 9/21/25
chigger said:
I agree the water issue is much more real than the nuclear one.

Texas data centers are projected to use about 49 billion gallons of water in 2025, a figure expected to increase to 399 billion gallons annually by 2030, potentially representing 6.6% of the state's total water usage. These facilities require significant amounts of water, primarily for cooling servers, with consumption ranging from hundreds of thousands to millions of gallons daily for individual large-scale centers.

There are already concerns about extreme water supply over the next decade. Texas needs put as much money as it can into building more reservoirs across the state for water retention,
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doubledog
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2:10p, 9/21/25
The open loop cooling (evaporation towers) does consume a lot of water. The closed loop systems with refrigeration uses much less water, but consumes more energy. Of course if you have a dedicated Th base nuclear reactor than that would not be an issue.
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textar4404
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In reply to doubledog • 5:53p, 9/21/25
doubledog said:
OP read up on the new smaller Thorium-based nuclear power plants. The risks are minimal verses the benefits.

Just a reminder, TAMU has been operating a working fission reactor and cyclotron since 1961 and 1964 respectively, without any incidents.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thorium-based_nuclear_power



I remember back in the mid 90's hearing about the cyclotron running without certain shielding in place which irradiated the parking lot between the cyclotron building and the engineering physics building. Always wondered if there was any truth to that.
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PS3D
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In reply to BobAchgill • 6:27p, 9/21/25
BobAchgill said:

Class of '81, B.S.M.E.


How could you have gone to A&M in a STEM or STEM-adjacent program and know so little about nuclear power?

I am lead to believe you either know nothing about what you are talking about or have some ulterior motive.
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BCS-Ag
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7:38a, 9/22/25
I supported nuclear power before the RELLIS announcement and am happy to see us at the forefront as a University & Community.

For better or worse, AI is a huge part of humanity's future and I believe playing an active part is the best way to shape it, so support data centers generally. However, these need to be placed intelligently - I believe an applied research campus like RELLIS is a good fit.
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Ag97
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9:25a, 9/22/25
AG
That's a big MEH on the nuclear issue. Today's reactors are safe and well regulated. I'd be more worried about a host of other potential environmental impacting industries. The large solar farms and potential water contamination from frac operations and their disposal wells is of much more concern to me.

Water is an issue and has been an issue for awhile. Most of the state has been in catch up mode for 20+ years due to the exploding population. If you want to campaign for something useful, campaign for local water rights in all the counties adjacent to the large metro areas of San Antonio, Austin, Dallas/Ft. Worth and Houston as well at all the other rural counties in the state. The unfortunate reality is those metro areas make up probably 2/3rds of the population and will vote their interest over ours all day long. The only hope we have is that we have enough rural county population and state reps with enough citizen participation in voting to get some kind of protection for our water rights via new laws. Currently, all the power lies with the landowners and they have the right to sell their water rights to whoever will pay the most.

The water boards that are supposed to regulate these ground water resources are susceptible to our democratic process. You may have great local board members all in on protecting water resources for local populations but all it takes is some of that big city money being spent to get their candidates elected to these boards to get their permits passed. Once passed there is nothing that can be done. Those wells and the water that lays beneath is now owned by the large cities in perpetuity.

We need reservoirs. Capture the flood waters on the Navasota or Brazos. Gonna be expensive for eminent domain to obtain the land needed but it makes the most sense. Would probably have to be the Navasota for a reasonable reservoir. The Brazos flood plain is too flat and wide to make sense anywhere close by that i can think of. The Navasota seems to have less populated areas and a more narrow and deeper flood plain to utilize.
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Rapier108
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In reply to Ag97 • 9:34a, 9/22/25
Ag97 said:
We need reservoirs. Capture the flood waters on the Navasota or Brazos. Gonna be expensive for eminent domain to obtain the land needed but it makes the most sense. Would probably have to be the Navasota for a reasonable reservoir. The Brazos flood plain is too flat and wide to make sense anywhere close by that i can think of. The Navasota seems to have less populated areas and a more narrow and deeper flood plain to utilize.

The NIMBYs got that idea killed in 2010 when they scuttled the Millican Reservoir.
"If you will not fight for right when you can easily win without blood shed; if you will not fight when your victory is sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves." - Sir Winston Churchill
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GSS
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In reply to Rapier108 • 10:16a, 9/22/25
Rapier108 said:
Ag97 said:
We need reservoirs. Capture the flood waters on the Navasota or Brazos. Gonna be expensive for eminent domain to obtain the land needed but it makes the most sense. Would probably have to be the Navasota for a reasonable reservoir. The Brazos flood plain is too flat and wide to make sense anywhere close by that i can think of. The Navasota seems to have less populated areas and a more narrow and deeper flood plain to utilize.

The NIMBYs heritage land owners got that idea killed in 2010 when they scuttled the Millican Reservoir.

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AggiePhil
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3:41p, 9/22/25
AG
I agree that we need to dam up some rivers and create lakes. Crazy that we don't have more lakes here, in a river valley!
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AggiePhil
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4:55p, 9/22/25
AG
Millican Reservoir discussion:

https://texags.com/forums/35/topics/1605946

https://texags.com/forums/35/topics/1826728
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TyHolden
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6:36p, 9/22/25
AG
Dam it
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plant science guy
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12:30p, 9/23/25
When we say "consumed" water, what do we mean? You can't make nothing out of something, the water still exists, so how does the water change after it passes through the data center?

Can it be reused?

Does it have to be fresh or can it be brackish or reclaimed?

What are the requirements here?
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doubledog
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In reply to plant science guy • 1:54p, 9/23/25
plant science guy said:
When we say "consumed" water, what do we mean? You can't make nothing out of something, the water still exists, so how does the water change after it passes through the data center?

Can it be reused?

Does it have to be fresh or can it be brackish or reclaimed?

What are the requirements here?

If it is evaporative cooling then it is undergoing a phase change. (liquid to vapor). I suppose you could condense it again, but that defeats the purpose.
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BQ_90
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In reply to AggiePhil • 2:39p, 9/23/25
AG
AggiePhil said:
I agree that we need to dam up some rivers and create lakes. Crazy that we don't have more lakes here, in a river valley!

easy to say when it's not your property
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plant science guy
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In reply to doubledog • 7:01a, 9/24/25
doubledog said:
plant science guy said:
When we say "consumed" water, what do we mean? You can't make nothing out of something, the water still exists, so how does the water change after it passes through the data center?

Can it be reused?

Does it have to be fresh or can it be brackish or reclaimed?

What are the requirements here?

If it is evaporative cooling then it is undergoing a phase change. (liquid to vapor). I suppose you could condense it again, but that defeats the purpose.

So that's the question, is it evaporative cooling?

The AI summary from a quick google search lists like 5 or 6 different means used to cool the servers. Is it necessary to use that much water or is it just cheaper?
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doubledog
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In reply to plant science guy • 7:57a, 9/24/25
plant science guy said:
doubledog said:
plant science guy said:
When we say "consumed" water, what do we mean? You can't make nothing out of something, the water still exists, so how does the water change after it passes through the data center?

Can it be reused?

Does it have to be fresh or can it be brackish or reclaimed?

What are the requirements here?

If it is evaporative cooling then it is undergoing a phase change. (liquid to vapor). I suppose you could condense it again, but that defeats the purpose.

So that's the question, is it evaporative cooling?

The AI summary from a quick google search lists like 5 or 6 different means used to cool the servers. Is it necessary to use that much water or is it just cheaper?

It is cheaper for evaporative cooling compared to refrigerated closed loops.
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Animal Eight 84
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In reply to plant science guy • 11:28a, 9/24/25
AG
plant science guy said:
doubledog said:
plant science guy said:
When we say "consumed" water, what do we mean? You can't make nothing out of something, the water still exists, so how does the water change after it passes through the data center?

Can it be reused?

Does it have to be fresh or can it be brackish or reclaimed?

What are the requirements here?

If it is evaporative cooling then it is undergoing a phase change. (liquid to vapor). I suppose you could condense it again, but that defeats the purpose.

So that's the question, is it evaporative cooling?

The AI summary from a quick google search lists like 5 or 6 different means used to cool the servers. Is it necessary to use that much water or is it just cheaper?


Water is a more effective medium for heat transfer than air. Plus the evaporation of water transfers significant amount of calories from the liquid to the atmosphere.

Once the heat is rejected to the atmosphere that evaporated liquid is lost as vapor-until it rains again.

You can briefly put your hand into a 350 degree air temperature oven and pull out a pan (using protection from the hot metal).
But you won't put your hand into a 212deg pot of boiling water.

Scaling of the heat transfer surfaces requires clean water, usually with anti-scaling chemicals added. Scaling acts like insulation and inhibits the transfer of heat
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TyHolden
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11:59a, 9/24/25
AG
Could Boring drill a tunnel from Galveston to College Station? We could use salt water for the nuclear facilities. Use subs for transportation between here and there.
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b0ridi
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In reply to TyHolden • 12:21p, 9/24/25
TyHolden said:
Could Boring drill a tunnel from Galveston to College Station? We could use salt water for the nuclear facilities. Use subs for transportation between here and there.

That's gonna be a bit more expensive than baseball fields/convention center/YMCA.
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BobAchgill
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5:26p, 9/30/25
1) These 4 SMRs being started up at RELLIS are the first to be used commercially in the US.

A nuclear power generator on a submarine or ship has the benefit of massive cooling.

Large nuclear power stations on land have huge cooling lakes.

How many seconds can your car run before you totally destroy your engine when you drop your lower radiator hose? Its about 15 seconds.

Water security Bryan city council said last December BCS has 8-10 years of water left down from 50 years. I was the only citizen at the meeting. We should be in rethink mode about water users. It takes 8-10 years to put in a desalination line to the Gulf to supply Central Texas needs. It will not be pretty when cities in central Texas start running out of water. They are already coming to our aquifer which is why our water security fell. Our aquifer does not recharge fast, it is more like a fossil aquifer. Watering a golf course now may be the water you need in 10 years to drink. If San Antonio did not get water from our aquifer they say the comal river would become an ecological problem. Their aquifer is too low.

As of Sept 1 oil and gas producers are free to dump their billions of gallons of "treated" "produced" fracking water in rivers and on farmland. Why do they want to? Its cost prohibitive to pump 5 barrels of water for every 1 barrel of oil to then have to reinject the spoiled water. Cleaning the PFAS out of surface water using reverse osmosis is water hungry... tailings effluent with the rejected PFAS, etc wastes water.

Power, Power, Power... what are they going to do when the nuclear power generators need to be taken offline for startup issues. If they pull power from the grid, will we be competing with the datacenter for our power needs? We know who will win that battle. Their budget is $15 billion ??? ... Bryan is $1 billion and College Station is $350 million.

Once installed the city's will have no legislative power over them. They can easily pay $10,000 fines per day. Or hire 50 lawyers to our 2.

Ask the realtors. How will land prices go within 5 miles of RELLIS??? With the right wind direction I guess the folks in Traditions will hear the distant roar of Gas turbine backup generators sounding off.

After my degree I worked in the Chem plant for 7 years. I saw very reputable companies that had stellar performance history with their product line encounter catastrophic problems when they were introducing a new tweak to their established product. There really is no margin.

From where i sit... any of the above, nuclear, water, power are just as likely to turn BCS into a ghost town.

I wonder how it would sit for Austin folks if they had this 5 miles from their downtown? Our city and A&M leaders have kept the details from the ones they work for... what is the water usage? How are we going to get desalinated water soon enough? What backup power will be used? Can it be remote so we don't hear it? What is the assurance plan for evacuation? Are the roads wide enough to support an evacuation? Can we pull the plug if the experiment at RELLIS does not go well?
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doubledog
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In reply to BobAchgill • 5:45p, 9/30/25
BobAchgill said:
1) These 4 SMRs being started up at RELLIS are the first to be used commercially in the US.

A nuclear power generator on a submarine or ship has the benefit of massive cooling.

Large nuclear power stations on land have huge cooling lakes.

How many seconds can your car run before you totally destroy your engine when you drop your lower radiator hose? Its about 15 seconds.


The experimental units at the Rellis campus are not the older designs that you are no doubt familiar with. These are molten thorium salt reactors. They have closed loop cooling/steam designs and are not the water hogs you see for the older reactors. They do not need large bodies of water to operate.

Molten metal salt reactors have a fail-safe mechanism. A fusible plug at the bottom of the reactor melts in the event of a power failure or if temperatures exceed a set limit, draining and dispersing the fuel into an underground tank for safe storage.

Although I normally do not recommend Wikipedia pages you may consider reading about the uses both pro and con for these reactors. Given the ever increasing energy demands the Thorium based reactors are a good alternative to other forms of energy production.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thorium-based_nuclear_power
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EBrazosAg
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7:34p, 9/30/25
AG
Agree with above. In general the industry realizes that water cooled reactors are antiquated and not the way to move forward. Molten salt reactors will likely take the day. At least that is what I understand.
No material on this site is intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. See full Medical Disclaimer.
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Animal Eight 84
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In reply to doubledog • 12:56a, 10/1/25
AG
doubledog said:

The experimental units at the Rellis campus are not the older designs that you are no doubt familiar with. These are molten thorium salt reactors. They have closed loop cooling/steam designs and are not the water hogs you see for the older reactors. They do not need large bodies of water to operate.



You sure about that? Correct me if I'm wrong.

The cooling water is to cool the non radioactive steam exhausting from the steam turbines.

There are three loops.
- primary salt loop removing heat from reactor and heating water in a heat exchanger. The design I've seen add an additional non radioactive primary salt loop to ensure water doesn't reach the reactor if a heat exchanger leak occurs.

- secondary loop which is non radioactive steam heated in the heat exchanger by the hot salt. It powers the turbine and is cooled to a liquid in the condenser. It is closed loop which is pumped back to the salt heat exchangers.

-Tertiary loop which cools the exhaust steam from the turbine in a vacuum condenser. This uses large amounts of water to operate.

All power plants using steam turbines reject phase change heat to the environment whether it is a coal, natural gas, or nuclear heat source. There are a few air cooled machines but vast majority use an ocean/lake/river.
Some have cooling towers but those all have a large makeup water supply for the evaporative cooling loss.

No operating conventional nuclear plant uses large amounts of daily makeup water in the primary or secondary loops. That water is very pure, expensive, and leaks are lost megawatts. Primary loop leakage is strictly regulated and cleanup of leakage is expensive.

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doubledog
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In reply to Animal Eight 84 • 7:57a, 10/1/25
Animal Eight 84 said:
doubledog said:

The experimental units at the Rellis campus are not the older designs that you are no doubt familiar with. These are molten thorium salt reactors. They have closed loop cooling/steam designs and are not the water hogs you see for the older reactors. They do not need large bodies of water to operate.



You sure about that? Correct me if I'm wrong.

The cooling water is to cool the non radioactive steam exhausting from the steam turbines.

There are three loops.
- primary salt loop removing heat from reactor and heating water in a heat exchanger. The design I've seen add an additional non radioactive primary salt loop to ensure water doesn't reach the reactor if a heat exchanger leak occurs.

- secondary loop which is non radioactive steam heated in the heat exchanger by the hot salt. It powers the turbine and is cooled to a liquid in the condenser. It is closed loop which is pumped back to the salt heat exchangers.

-Tertiary loop which cools the exhaust steam from the turbine in a vacuum condenser. This uses large amounts of water to operate.

All power plants using steam turbines reject phase change heat to the environment whether it is a coal, natural gas, or nuclear heat source. There are a few air cooled machines but vast majority use an ocean/lake/river.
Some have cooling towers but those all have a large makeup water supply for the evaporative cooling loss.

No operating conventional nuclear plant uses large amounts of daily makeup water in the primary or secondary loops. That water is very pure, expensive, and leaks are lost megawatts. Primary loop leakage is strictly regulated and cleanup of leakage is expensive.


There are generally two methods to dissipate waste heat. Two common heat sinks are the closed loop cooling towers and the other is an open loop, body of water, where hot water is discharged into the reservoir and cool water is then drawn back into the system (theoretically a net loss of water).

The reservoir system is more affordable (see modern fossil fuel electrical generation plants), however if water sources, climate etc. and not adaptable then cooling towers will suffice.

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Animal Eight 84
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In reply to doubledog • 8:37a, 10/1/25
AG
Cooling water usage for a Steam Turbine powered by a Salt Reactor will be the exact same amount if powered by Coal, Natural Gas, or Conventional Nuclear .

Both natural draft & forced air cooling towers need a significant amount of clean water to makeup for operational losses.

Cooling towers lose water constantly two ways. First is evaporation. That's how they cool the water. The second is blowdown. They maintain Total Dissolved Solids by throwing away some water(blowdown )and replacing it with clean makeup water.
This water loss is based on cooling load, water temp, and wet bulb temperature of the air.

FYI I've been to several power plants and worked at a large nuclear power station most of my life.
However, I know very little about salt cooled small reactors, just what I've read.
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doubledog
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In reply to Animal Eight 84 • 10:50a, 10/1/25
Animal Eight 84 said:
Cooling water usage for a Steam Turbine powered by a Salt Reactor will be the exact same amount if powered by Coal, Natural Gas, or Conventional Nuclear .

Both natural draft & forced air cooling towers need a significant amount of clean water to makeup for operational losses.

Cooling towers lose water constantly two ways. First is evaporation. That's how they cool the water. The second is blowdown. They maintain Total Dissolved Solids by throwing away some water(blowdown )and replacing it with clean makeup water.
This water loss is based on cooling load, water temp, and wet bulb temperature of the air.

FYI I've been to several power plants and worked at a large nuclear power station most of my life.
However, I know very little about salt cooled small reactors, just what I've read.

You are correct for the larger 1Giga watt nuclear (or coal/gas) power plants.

The Small Thorium Reactors (such as the experimental ones at Rellis) produce around 50 Mega Watt (0.05 Gwatts). In that case the so called "dry" cooling towers can be used.

https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=36773
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FamousAgg
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11:49a, 10/1/25
It's not 4 reactors, it's 4 reactor companies, they could each build multiple reactors
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