Georgia's energy consumption (US State)

Summary: Georgia was one of the first states to use electric power, an accomplishment that can be traced to the beginning of two companies: Savannah Electric and Georgia Power.

The cities of Atlanta and Savannah, Georgia, installed electric streetlights in the early 1880s, on the heels of Thomas Alva Edison’s marketing of the first electric lightbulb in 1879. The Brush Electric Company of Savannah was formed in 1882 and installed four electric lights in downtown Savannah to start electric power use on the Georgia coast. The Brush Electric Company eventually became Savannah Electric, which existed for more than one hundred years before being acquired by much larger rival Georgia Power in 2006.

Savannah Electric’s rival, Georgia Power, had its beginnings at about the same time. In 1883, the company that would become Georgia Power, the Georgia Electric Light Company of Atlanta, was formed as the first Atlanta-based power company in Georgia. This power company, like its counterpart in Savannah, was also formed to install and operate electric streetlights. In 1884, the first coal-fired electric generating power plant in Georgia was built by the Georgia Electric Light Company in what is now downtown Atlanta, and before the end of that decade this plant was powering streetlights and electric streetcars. Soon after Georgia Electric Light Company’s founding, Atlanta banker Henry Atkinson bought shares in the fledgling company, until he owned enough stock to control of the company. In 1902, Atkinson hired Atlanta lawyer Preston Arkwright to restructure the company as the Georgia Railway and Electric Company, and Arkwright led the company for several years.

The Georgia Railway and Electric Company was eventually restructured into the Georgia Power Company, which developed into the largest power provider in Georgia. Atkinson is considered Georgia Power’s founder, and Arkwright is considered Georgia Power’s first company president. The company grew until it was the largest power provider the state of Georgia. In the 1920s, Georgia Power was acquired and made a subsidiary of the holding company Southeastern Power and Light. In 1949, Southeastern Power and Light was reincorporated as the current Southern Company. Georgia Power operates the generating plants, transmission lines, and distribution lines of Southern Company in Georgia. In 2022, Georgia Power owned and operated 11,855 miles of transmission lines and 78,583 miles of distribution lines in its assigned areas of Georgia.

Until the 1930s, most of the electrification of Georgia was limited to the larger cities, but when Congress enacted the Rural Electrification Act as part of President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal, the Rural Electrification Administration (REA) came into existence, allowing the creation of electric membership corporations (EMCs). EMCs would bring electric power to rural areas of Georgia. In rural Georgia, as of 2010, there were 42 EMCs serving a significant amount (although less than half) of Georgia’s residential customers. In 1974, 39 of these EMCs joined to form the Oglethorpe Power Corporation (OPC). The company took its name from the founder of both the Georgia colony and the city of Savannah, James E. Oglethorpe. Oglethorpe Power, along with the Municipal Electric Authority of Georgia (MEAG) and the city of Dalton, co-own several natural gas, coal-fired, and nuclear power plants in the state of Georgia.

Electric power is also supplied by government-based organizations, including the Tennessee Valley Authority, which provides power in the northern section of the state. Several municipal power providers exist statewide. In 1975, MEAG was created by an act of the Georgia state legislature and 47 municipal power suppliers joined MEAG; two more, the city of Oxford and the city of Acworth, joined later. These 49 municipal power entities exist as MEAG and provide power to their territories, mainly small to midsize cities.

In the 1970s, demand for electricity started to increase in the wake of a widespread demand for electric air-conditioning and other home appliances, such as televisions and, later, personal computers. By 2022, Georgia Power’s sales had increased to 88.4 billion kilowatt-hours. This power was generated by several sources, including oil and gas burning, coal, nuclear fission, and hydroelectric generation. Coal was Georgia's primary source of energy for decades, but in the 2010s, the state began shutting down coal-fired power plants and focusing more on natural gas. By 2022, natural gas accounted for more than 6.2 million kilowatts of energy, coal for 3.9 million kilowatts, nuclear for 1.9 million, and renewable energy for about 358,000. Hydropower was Georgia's main source of renewable energy with 1.1 million kilowatts.

Nuclear Power in Georgia

In 1967, Southern Company committed to building two nuclear sites in Georgia. The first was named the Edwin I. Hatch Power Plant and comprises a two-unit boiling-water reactor (BWR) built near Baxley, Georgia. Hatch Unit 1 went into operation in 1975, and Hatch Unit 2 went into operation in 1979. The BWR design uses heat from the fission of uranium to boil water that is in the reactor vessel. This potentially contaminated steam goes to the main turbine and then is returned to the boiler after it condenses in a large heat exchanger, simply named the condenser. Each of the two generators at Hatch can output approximately 924 megawatts of electric power (a single megawatt can power approximately 500 residential homes).

The Vogtle Power Plant, the second nuclear site constructed in Georgia, comprises two units. Unit 1 went into operation in 1987, and Unit 2 went into operation in 1989. This plant uses the pressurized-water reactor (PWR), which is the same type of reactor that the US Navy uses to power its aircraft carriers and submarines. Each of the existing two generators at Vogtle can produce 1,106 megawatts of electric power. In 2015 the Department of Energy issued a $6.5 billion loan to the Georgia Power Company and Oglethorpe Power Corporation to construct two new units at the Vogtle plant. Units 3 and 4 both came online in 2024. The four reactors had a combined output of 5 gigawatts, making the Vogtle Power Plant the largest nuclear power facility in the United States.

Coal-Fired Power in Georgia

More than half of Georgia’s electric generation comes from coal-fired power plants. The largest coal-fired power plant in the United States, the Robert W. Scherer Power Plant, is in Georgia. It is operated by Georgia Power but owned by Georgia Power, Gulf Power, OPC, MEAG, the city of Dalton, Florida Power and Light, and Jacksonville Electric.

Bibliography

Barlament, James. “Savannah Electric and Power Company.” Georgia Encyclopedia, 8 June 2017, www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/business-economy/savannah-electric-and-power-company/. Accessed 1 Aug. 2024.

“Facts & Figures.” Georgia Power, 2024, www.georgiapower.com/content/dam/georgia-power/pdfs/company-pdfs/about-us/gpc-history.pdf. Accessed 1 Aug. 2024.

"Georgia." US Energy Information Administration, 15 Feb. 2024, www.eia.gov/state/?sid=GA. Accessed 1 Aug. 2024.

“History of Georgia Power.” Georgia Power, www.georgiapower.com/content/dam/georgia-power/pdfs/company-pdfs/about-us/gpc-history.pdf. Accessed 1 Aug. 2024.

“Plant Vogtle Unit 4 Begins Commercial Operation.” US Energy Information Administration, 1 May 2024, www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=61963. Accessed 1 Aug. 2024.