Georgia Power Company Request for Certification of Capacity from the 2029–2031 All-Source RFP and Supplemental Resources
Synapse provided expert testimony and analysis to support the Sierra Club and the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy (SACE) in reviewing Georgia Power Company’s application for certification of capacity from its 2029–2031 All-Source Request for Proposals (RFP) and supplemental resources. The primary purpose of Synapse’s testimony was to evaluate whether Georgia Power demonstrated that it needs the full 10 gigawatts of capacity for which it sought approval.
Synapse found that data center load growth is driving Georgia Power’s need for capacity, and that the Company is putting existing ratepayers at risk by procuring capacity for prospective data center customers before these customers have executed contracts for electric service. Synapse recommended reducing the quantity of resource procurements to match signed customer contracts, which would allow Georgia Power to remove the most expensive and risky resources from its proposed portfolio. We found that McIntosh Unit 12, a combined cycle unit with particularly high capital costs and fixed fuel costs, is one of the resources Georgia Power should remove. In general, we recommended that Georgia Power focus its near-term procurement on battery storage. Because of battery resources’ size, lifetime, and modularity, batteries provide much-needed flexibility for Georgia Power to respond to the uncertain pace and magnitude of data center load growth.
Finally, Synapse recommended measures that Georgia Power should take to minimize price increases associated with large-load additions and protect its existing ratepayers from cost-shifting associated with prospective large-load customers. This includes pursuing strategies such as customer demand flexibility, distributed energy resources, and behind the meter generation. Georgia Power should also increase the transparency around large-load customer contracts and establish tariffs that commit large-load customers to paying their full incremental cost of service.