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Georgia Power is an electric utility headquartered in
Atlanta Atlanta ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Georgia (U.S. state), most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia. It is the county seat, seat of Fulton County, Georg ...
,
Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the South Caucasus * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the southeastern United States Georgia may also refer to: People and fictional characters * Georgia (name), a list of pe ...
, United States. It was established as the Georgia Railway and Power Company and began operations in 1902 running
streetcars in Atlanta Streetcars originally operated in Atlanta downtown and into the surrounding areas from 1871 until the final line's closure in 1949. The first such transportation began with horsecars in 1871, and electric streetcar service started in the 188 ...
as a successor to the Atlanta Consolidated Street Railway Company. Georgia Power is the largest of the four electric utilities that are owned and operated by
Southern Company Southern Company is an American gas and electric utility holding company based in the Southern United States. It is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, with executive offices located in Birmingham, Alabama. As of 2021 it is the second largest ut ...
. Georgia Power is an investor-owned, tax-paying
public utility A public utility company (usually just utility) is an organization that maintains the infrastructure for a public service (often also providing a service using that infrastructure). Public utilities are subject to forms of public control and ...
that serves more than 2.4 million customers in all but four of Georgia's 159 counties. It employs approximately 9,000 workers throughout the state. The Georgia Power Building, its primary corporate
office building An office is a space where the employees of an organization perform administrative work in order to support and realize the various goals of the organization. The word "office" may also denote a position within an organization with specific du ...
, is located at 241
Ralph McGill Ralph Emerson McGill (February 5, 1898 – February 3, 1969) was an American journalist and editorialist. An anti-segregationist editor, he published the ''Atlanta Constitution'' newspaper. He was a member of the Peabody Awards Board of Ju ...
Boulevard in
downtown Atlanta Downtown Atlanta is the central business district of Atlanta, Georgia, United States. The largest of the city's three commercial districts (Midtown Atlanta, Midtown and Buckhead being the others), it is the location of many corporate and region ...
. In 2006, the Savannah Electric & Power Company, a separate
subsidiary A subsidiary, subsidiary company, or daughter company is a company (law), company completely or partially owned or controlled by another company, called the parent company or holding company, which has legal and financial control over the subsidia ...
of Southern Company, was merged into Georgia Power.


History

Originally the Georgia Railway and Power Company, it began in 1902 as a company running the
streetcars in Atlanta Streetcars originally operated in Atlanta downtown and into the surrounding areas from 1871 until the final line's closure in 1949. The first such transportation began with horsecars in 1871, and electric streetcar service started in the 188 ...
and was the
successor Successor may refer to: * An entity that comes after another (see Succession (disambiguation)) Film and TV * ''The Successor'' (1996 film), a film including Laura Girling * The Successor (2023 film), a French drama film * ''The Successor'' ( ...
to the Atlanta Consolidated Street Railway Company. In the 1930s, the company published a free newsletter called ''Two Bells'' which was distributed on its streetcars. Two Bells was carried on being distributed into the 1960s on the buses of a successor Atlanta Transit Company (ATC). From 1937 until 1950, Georgia Power also operated trolleybuses in Atlanta, and in 1950 its network of 31 electric bus routes was the largest trolley bus system in the United States. Sebree, Mac; and Ward, Paul (1974). ''The Trolley Coach in North America'', pp. 14–19. Los Angeles: Interurbans. LCCN 74-20367. After the Atlanta transit strike of 1950, the Atlanta Transit Company took over operations. Atlanta Streetcar was formed in the 2000s to establish a new
streetcar A tram (also known as a streetcar or trolley in Canada and the United States) is an urban rail transit in which vehicles, whether individual railcars or multiple-unit trains, run on tramway tracks on urban public streets; some include s ...
service along
Peachtree Street Peachtree Street is one of several major streets running through the city of Atlanta, Georgia, United States. Beginning at Five Points (Atlanta), Five Points in downtown Atlanta, it runs North through Midtown Atlanta, Midtown; a few blocks afte ...
. The company built several
dam A dam is a barrier that stops or restricts the flow of surface water or underground streams. Reservoirs created by dams not only suppress floods but also provide water for activities such as irrigation, human consumption, industrial use, aqua ...
s, including the Morgan Falls Dam just north of the city, and some as far away as the
Tallulah River The Tallulah River ( ) is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map, accessed April 26, 2011 river in Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia and North Carolina. It begins in Clay County, North Car ...
in the northeast Georgia mountains. These
hydroelectric Hydroelectricity, or hydroelectric power, is Electricity generation, electricity generated from hydropower (water power). Hydropower supplies 15% of the world's electricity, almost 4,210 TWh in 2023, which is more than all other Renewable energ ...
dams form Lake Burton, Lake Seed,
Lake Rabun Lake Rabun is a twisty reservoir with of shoreline located in the Northeastern corner of the U.S. state of Georgia in Rabun County. It is the third lake in a six-lake series that follows the original course of the Tallulah River. The series b ...
, Lake Tallulah Falls, Lake Tugalo, and Lake Yonah, the last two of which straddle the Georgia –
South Carolina South Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders North Carolina to the north and northeast, the Atlantic Ocean to the southeast, and Georgia (U.S. state), Georg ...
border on the Tugaloo River. Following cost increases in August 2018 for building two additional nuclear reactors at its
Vogtle Electric Generating Plant The Alvin W. Vogtle Electric Generating Plant, also known as Plant Vogtle ( ), is a four-unit nuclear power plant located in Burke County, near Waynesboro, Georgia, in the southeastern United States. With a power capacity of 4,536 megawatts, ...
, credit rating agency
Moody's Moody's Ratings, previously and still legally known as Moody's Investors Service and often referred to as Moody's, is the bond credit rating business of Moody's Corporation, representing the company's traditional line of business and its histo ...
downgraded Georgia Power's credit ratings from A3 (upper medium) to Baa1 (lower medium). In September 2018, in order to sustain the project, Georgia Power agreed to pay an additional proportion of the costs of the smaller project partners if completion costs exceeded $9.2 billion. In 2019, Georgia Power's CEO, Paul Bowers, testified before state regulators seeking to get an approval for the company's request to add about $200 a year to the average residential customer's bills. In June 2021, Georgia Power again sought a $235 million a year rates increase once Vogtle unit 3 starts operation, an overall 10% increase in rates, to recover capital construction costs and operating costs.


Oil Pollution Prevention Violation

In August 2022, the EPA fined Georgia Power $1,906 after an Atlanta facility failed an audit for oil spill prevention. Among other violations, it was found that Georgia Power had no method of predicting a potential oil spill, no containment plan, and inadequate facility drainage.


Coal power

Georgia Power operates the Robert W. Scherer Power Plant, also known as Plant Scherer, in Monroe County, Georgia. According to '' Natural History Magazine'', in 2006 Plant Scherer was the largest single point-source for
carbon dioxide Carbon dioxide is a chemical compound with the chemical formula . It is made up of molecules that each have one carbon atom covalent bond, covalently double bonded to two oxygen atoms. It is found in a gas state at room temperature and at norma ...
emissions in the United States. It was also ranked the 20th in the world in terms of carbon dioxide emissions by the
Center for Global Development The Center for Global Development (CGD) is a nonprofit think tank based in Washington, D.C., and London that focuses on international development. History It was founded in November 2001 by former senior U.S. official Edward W. Scott, directo ...
on its list of global power plants in November 2007. It was the only power plant in the United States that was listed among the world's top 25 carbon dioxide producers.


Transmission system

Georgia Power utilizes transmission lines carrying 115,000 volts, 230,000 volts and 500,000 volts. Georgia Power has interconnections with the
Tennessee Valley Authority The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) is a federally owned electric utility corporation in the United States. TVA's service area covers all of Tennessee, portions of Alabama, Mississippi, and Kentucky, and small areas of Georgia, North Carolin ...
to the north, sister company Alabama Power to the west, Dominion Energy and
Duke Energy Duke Energy Corporation is an American electric power and natural gas holding company headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina. The company ranked as the 141st largest company in the United States in 2024 – its highest-ever placement on the ...
to the east, and Florida Power & Light, Duke, and the city of Tallahassee to the south.


Transition to renewables and Plant Mitchell shutdown

Georgia Power asked the state's public service commission for approval to convert the coal-fired Plant Mitchell to run on wood fuel. If approved, the
retrofit Retrofitting is the addition of new technology or features to older systems. Retrofits can happen for a number of reasons, for example with big capital expenditures like naval vessels, military equipment or manufacturing plants, businesses or go ...
would have begun in 2011 and the biomass plant would have started operating in mid-2012. The biomass plant would have run on surplus wood from suppliers within a radius of the plant, which is located near
Albany, Georgia Albany ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia. Located on the Flint River, it is the county seat of Dougherty County, Georgia, Dougherty County, and is the sole incorporated city in that county. Located in Southwest Geo ...
. However, in 2014, the company announced it was decertifying the plant and intended to close its operations by April 2015; Plant Mitchell was shut down in 2016; , discharged water from the plant's ash pond is being monitored.


Generating facilities

Georgia Power owns and operates a total of 46 generating plants which include hydroelectric dams, fossil fueled generating plants and nuclear power plants, which provide electricity to more than 2.4 million customers in all but four of Georgia's counties.


Hydroelectric dams

Georgia Power Hydro incorporates 19 hydro electric generating units to produce a generation capacity of 1,087,536 kilowatts (KW). Georgia Power Hydro facilities also provide more than of water and more than of shoreline for habitat and recreational use.


Fossil fuel power plants


Nuclear power plants


References


Notes

* Kurtz, Wilber, "Technical Advisor: The Making of ''Gone With The Wind''. The Hollywood Journals", '' Atlanta Historical Journal'', Vol. XXII, No.2, Summer, 1978.


External links

*
Southern CompanyGeorgia Power
historical marker
Georgia Railway and Power Company Trolley Waiting Station
historical marker {{Authority control Companies based in Atlanta Electric power companies of the United States Companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange Energy infrastructure in Georgia (U.S. state) 1945 establishments in Georgia (U.S. state) Hydroelectric power companies of the United States Nuclear power companies of the United States Energy companies established in 1945 Non-renewable resource companies established in 1945 Southern Company Energy in Georgia (U.S. state)