Georgia Power's approved Integrated Resource Plan commits the utility to extended power uprates at the Vogtle and Hatch nuclear stations and leaves the door open to additional nuclear capacity later in the decade, according to World Nuclear News.

The near-term work centers on the two older Vogtle units. Reinvestment in Vogtle Units 1 and 2 will add roughly 27 megawatts electric at each unit, delivering about 54 MW of additional output from plant already built and licensed. Comparable uprates are planned at Hatch Units 1 and 2. Extended power uprates raise output by improving thermal efficiency and replacing limiting components rather than by constructing new capacity, which makes them among the least expensive megawatts a utility can add.

The driver is load. Georgia Power projects approximately 8,200 MW of electrical load growth, with peak demand rising more than 2,200 MW by the end of 2030 compared with the projection in its 2023 plan update. Data center construction across metro Atlanta and the broader state accounts for a large share of that revision.

On new construction, the utility told regulators that with adequate risk mitigation and the experience gained from building Vogtle Units 3 and 4, customers would benefit from additional nuclear capacity over the long term. Units 3 and 4 at the Waynesboro site were the first newly built reactors completed in the United States in more than three decades, and the four-unit station now represents about 4,536 MW of capacity.

Source: World Nuclear News - https://www.world-nuclear-news.org/articles/georgia-power-plans-additional-nuclear-capacity