Georgia’s energy regulators have approved one of the largest power expansions in state history, clearing the way for thousands of megawatts of new capacity aimed squarely at feeding a booming data center sector. The decision landed amid heated questions about cost, fairness, and who ultimately carries the risk.
A unanimous vote, and a very large number
On Friday evening in Atlanta, the Georgia Public Service Commission voted 5–0 to approve a plan requested by Georgia Power that authorizes close to 10,000 megawatts of additional generating capacity.
That is not a typo. Ten thousand megawatts is roughly equivalent to adding several midsize states’ worth of electricity demand in one go.
Commissioners framed the vote as a practical response to explosive growth in electricity use, driven mainly by large-scale data centers clustering around metro Atlanta and other fast-growing corridors.
Commission Chair Jason Shaw said the commission had fulfilled its basic responsibility. Growth is here, he noted, and utilities have to keep the lights on.
Still, the size and speed of the approval raised eyebrows across the hearing room.
Data centers loom over every calculation
The expansion plan leans heavily on forecasts that assume sustained, long-term growth from cloud computing firms, artificial intelligence workloads, and hyperscale server farms. Georgia has become a magnet for such facilities thanks to cheap land, tax incentives, and reliable power.
Georgia Power told regulators that without new generation, the grid could face serious strain within a few years.
Five new natural gas units are central to the proposal. They are slated for existing plant sites at Bowen, McIntosh, and Wansley, locations already familiar to communities that live nearby.
Critics pointed out that data center demand is notoriously hard to pin down. Projects get announced with fanfare, then paused, resized, or quietly shelved.
And once power plants are built, their costs do not vanish if forecasts miss the mark.
That uncertainty hung heavily over the proceedings.
Ratepayer protection becomes the flashpoint
Much of Friday’s debate centered on a negotiated agreement between Georgia Power and commission staff. The utility claims the deal creates at least $8.50 per month in “downward pressure” on residential bills by shifting more costs to large industrial users.
Supporters say that structure flips the usual script. Instead of households subsidizing corporate growth, the biggest energy users pay a premium.
Georgia Power Chief Executive Kim Greene leaned hard on that message after the vote.
She said the plan would keep more money in customers’ pockets and allow the state to handle demand that few other regions are even attempting to serve.
Behind the scenes, though, intervenors complained they had not been given enough access to the details that supposedly guarantee those savings.
Jennifer Whitfield, an attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center, asked commissioners to require fuller disclosure before approving the deal.
That request did not carry the day.
Environmental and ethical objections spill out
Opponents argue the decision shifts enormous financial and environmental risk onto ordinary Georgians.
Bob Sherrier, also with the Southern Environmental Law Center, called the vote a failure to protect existing customers. In his view, the commission approved a plan that exposes ratepayers to as much as $60 billion in long-term obligations tied to infrastructure built mainly for private data clients.
One sentence from critics kept coming up again and again. What happens if the demand never fully shows up?
There is no automatic off-ramp if data center growth cools. The plants remain. The debt remains.
Health concerns were raised as well, especially around methane emissions from the proposed gas units.
For residents near the plants, this is not abstract policy. It is local air, local water, and local risk.
Corporate profits enter the argument
The debate took on a sharper edge when critics pointed to Georgia Power’s parent company, Southern Company.
Southern Company reported about $1.7 billion in earnings between July and September this year, an increase from the same period last year. Those figures circulated widely during public comment.
For some speakers, the optics were impossible to ignore.
They argued that customers are being asked to shoulder new risks while shareholders enjoy strong returns.
Codi Norred, executive director of Georgia Interfaith Power and Light, described the tradeoff as morally wrong. In his words, communities are being asked to risk their health so profits can climb higher.
That line drew murmurs from the gallery.
The commission’s balancing act
Commissioners pushed back on the idea that they had rubber-stamped the utility’s request.
They emphasized that economic development depends on reliable electricity and that turning away large employers would carry its own costs.
Georgia, after all, has spent years marketing itself as a business-friendly state.
One commissioner noted that data centers do not just consume power. They also bring construction jobs, long-term tax revenue, and infrastructure investment.
Another pointed out that other states are racing to attract the same projects. Falling behind could mean losing out entirely.
Still, the lack of granular public data on the staff agreement left some observers uneasy.
Trust, in this case, is doing a lot of work.
What the approved plan includes
The scope of the expansion is broad, and its components stretch over many years. At a high level, the approval allows Georgia Power to:
-
Add nearly 10,000 megawatts of new capacity, much of it tied to data center demand
-
Construct five new natural gas units at existing power plant sites
-
Recover costs through long-term rate structures tied to forecasted large-customer use
Those bullet points sound clinical. On the ground, they translate into decades of infrastructure and billions in spending.
The commission did not impose a hard requirement that data center customers lock in long-term commitments before construction proceeds, a point critics seized upon.
A decision that will echo for years
Friday’s vote closed the formal docket, but it did not end the argument.
Environmental groups are weighing next steps. Consumer advocates are warning they will scrutinize future rate cases line by line.
Local communities near the proposed plant expansions are bracing for construction activity and increased scrutiny of emissions permits.
And the data center industry, watching closely, has received a clear signal. Georgia is open for business, and it is willing to build big to prove it.
Whether that gamble pays off, or backfires, will not be clear for a long time.
For now, the grid is set to grow, the debate is far from settled, and the costs, financial and otherwise, remain a shared question mark.
