Georgia Power names new CEO as utility embarks on huge expansion
Georgia Power has a new chairman, president and chief executive, part of a series of management changes announced Friday.
Stan Connally, chief operating officer for Southern Co., which owns Georgia Power and two other major electric companies, will step into the role starting Jan. 1.
He replaces Kim Greene, who will become the president of Southern Company Operations, a strategic and operational division of the energy giant. Greene will be in charge of Southern’s entire grid including its power plants and other infrastructure, as well as research and development and commercial operations, among other areas.
Southern is known for moving its top executives to other parts of the company, particularly if they could be in the running for top roles. Connally, for example, was the president and CEO of Gulf Power, now owned by Florida-based NextEra Energy, and Greene previously headed up Southern Company Gas.
“We’re in a transformative period for Southern Company, with tremendous growth and change creating new opportunities across our business,” said Chris Womack, Southern’s chairman, president and CEO.
Besides Georgia Power and the gas business, Southern owns electric companies in Alabama and Mississippi. It also operates a wholesale power unit and Southern Nuclear. In Greene’s new role, she will oversee Southern’s nuclear fleet, which includes Plant Vogtle’s two new units, which were the first in the U.S. to be built from scratch in nearly three decades.
Georgia Power has been capitalizing on the massive influx of data centers coming to the state. In Southern’s second-quarter earnings call, Womack made it clear to Wall Street analysts that growing that pipeline for data centers, which require unprecedented amounts of electricity to operate, is a key strategy for the company going forward.
Georgia Power and its regulator also have been under fire for hiking customer bills six times in the last three years, a move that cost two Georgia Public Service Commissioners their seats last year.
The utility has taken steps to freeze base rates for its customers and to lower bills overall as part of an agreement with the PSC. It also is embarking on an unprecedented buildout of its power grid, adding a large number of gas-fired power plants and some solar and battery storage, mostly to support data center growth.
The company said it has protections in place to shield other customers from paying for electricity and infrastructure that data center operators will be using.
In other moves, Sterling Spainhour, executive vice president and chief legal officer, will also head up Southern’s technology organization. Sloane Drake, executive vice president and chief human resources officer, will assume responsibility for systemwide training.
A note of disclosure
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