Two years after the completion of its expansion, Plant Vogtle near Waynesboro, Georgia continues to draw attention for both its output and its cost. Unit 3 entered commercial operation in July 2023 and Unit 4 followed in March 2024, completing an 11-year construction program and bringing the site to four reactors with a combined capacity of about 4,800 megawatts serving more than one million homes and businesses.
Each of the new reactors is rated at roughly 1,100 megawatts. Together they increased Georgia Power's total generating capacity by just over 7 percent. Early operating data indicates the two new units have run at lower capacity factors than the site's original reactors, which have been in service since the 1970s, a pattern consistent with the extended commissioning periods typical of first-of-a-kind builds.
The financial record remains the dominant point of discussion. The expansion was completed at a total cost of $36.8 billion. Residential and small commercial rates in Georgia Power's service territory have risen by more than 20 percent since the project's later phases, reflecting recovery of construction costs through rate proceedings before state regulators.
The units carry particular relevance for the current wave of nuclear development. Vogtle 3 and 4 remain the most recently completed reactors in the United States, and their construction record informs cost and schedule assumptions for the large-scale projects now under federal consideration.
Georgia's rising electricity demand, driven substantially by data center growth, has kept the plant's contribution to state supply in view.
Source: Utility Dive - https://www.utilitydive.com/news/after-2-years-ratepayer-pain-political-fallout-georgia-nuclear-vogtle/817792/