Every Georgia Power customer is paying a clock
they didn't see start.
In April 2009 the Georgia Public Service Commission authorized Georgia Power to charge ratepayers for two new Vogtle nuclear reactors before the plant produced any electricity. That mechanism, known as Construction Work In Progress, was supposed to last about seven years. It is now in its seventeenth. Each PSC docket that updates the Vogtle cost recovery has a brief intervention window. The window closes without notice. The rate adjustment lands on the bill.
Five Public Service Commissioners gather in a hearing room downtown. The room is open to the public. Almost nobody is in the seats. On the agenda is a vote to authorize Georgia Power to begin charging its customers for the construction of two new nuclear reactors at Plant Vogtle in Waynesboro, three hundred miles south. The reactors do not yet exist. The cost estimate is roughly fourteen billion dollars.
The commissioners vote yes. Georgia becomes the first state in modern American history to authorize Construction Work In Progress cost recovery for nuclear power. The clock starts.
Seventeen years later, the reactors are finally running. The final cost is closer to thirty-five billion. The clock has not stopped.
The CWIP clock has been running for seventeen years. The PSC has never paused it.
Construction Work In Progress flips the normal rule. Under standard utility regulation, a power company can only charge ratepayers for assets that are used and useful — operating, producing electricity. CWIP allows the utility to recover construction costs before the plant exists. In 2009, the Georgia legislature passed SB 31 authorizing this specifically for Vogtle. Every Georgia Power bill since has included a Vogtle line item.
Vogtle Unit 3 began commercial operation in 2023. Unit 4 followed in 2024. Until those dates, every dollar collected through CWIP was for an asset not yet producing electricity. The dates and the dollars are public; the PSC dockets that approved each successive rate adjustment are public; the intervention windows are public. Almost no Georgia Power customer has ever seen one.
Three questions about who lets utilities do this, and who doesn't. Most people guess wrong on at least two.
Construction Work In Progress is not a Georgia invention; it is a tool that exists in every state but is regulated very differently. Take a guess before the reveal.
If you've been a Georgia Power customer through Vogtle, how much have you paid?
The Vogtle cost recovery line on a Georgia Power bill is small per month and substantial over time. This calculator estimates your cumulative Vogtle contribution based on how long you've been a Georgia Power customer and your average monthly usage. The model is built from the PSC-approved Nuclear Construction Cost Recovery (NCCR) and Vogtle Construction Monitoring tariff schedules, reconciled against public filings.
If you live in Fulton County, you are paying for Vogtle right now.
Atlanta is paying for a plant three hundred miles away.
Georgia Power is the dominant electric utility for nearly all of metro Atlanta. Approximately one million residential customers across Fulton County alone receive their power from Georgia Power. Every one of those customers pays the Vogtle cost recovery line.
The plant itself is in Waynesboro, in Burke County, on the South Carolina border. Most Atlanta-area Georgia Power customers will never see it. The economic relationship runs the other direction: the bill paid in Buckhead funded the concrete poured in Burke. The bill paid in Penn Hills, Pennsylvania funds the equivalent mechanism on the PJM grid — see Brief 003 on the PA PUC large-load tariff proceeding. Same mechanism. Different reactor.
If you live in Atlanta and you have a Georgia Power bill, you are a Vogtle investor whose participation was not optional. The amount each month is small; the cumulative amount is not. The intervention windows that decide whether the rate adjusts up or down are open right now in PSC dockets that no one is watching.
Five clocks in. The pattern has the South in it now.
Briefs 001 through 004 worked through Pennsylvania and North Carolina, the L2 coverage we built first. Brief 005 lands in Georgia: the editorial home of the Mechanism Series and the location of the largest capital-cost transfer to ratepayers in modern American utility history. The clock named here is older, larger, and quieter than the four before it.
For the longer arc, see Episode 07 · The Physical Plant (the data center mechanism that consumes Vogtle's output), The Capital Stack (how Vogtle financing connects to the broader capital flows reshaping Georgia), and Brief 003 for the same cost-allocation mechanism on the PA grid.
The next Vogtle cost reconciliation will file. You can intervene. Most people don't.
Georgia PSC dockets accept written comments from any Georgia citizen. The Public Interest Advocacy staff cites volume of public comment. Four steps.
Find your most recent bill.
Locate the Nuclear Construction Cost Recovery (NCCR) or equivalent Vogtle line on your Georgia Power bill. It is typically near the bottom of the rate detail. The number per month is small; the cumulative number is not.
GEORGIA POWER →Pull up the PSC docket search.
The Georgia PSC publishes every docket online with intervenor lists, comment deadlines, and full filings. Search for "Vogtle" or "Nuclear Construction Cost Recovery" to see the active proceeding.
GA PSC DOCKETS →Read the PIA Staff filing.
The Public Interest Advocacy Staff files testimony and dissents on every Vogtle proceeding. Their filings name specific over-charges, methodology disputes, and reconciliation requests. They are written for the commission but understandable.
PIA STAFF FILINGS →File a public comment.
Georgia residents can file public comments on PSC dockets through the PSC website or by email. You do not need to be an attorney. The comment goes on the public record and is cited by PIA Staff in their argument volume.
FILE A COMMENT →"The Vogtle decision was not a secret. The PSC vote was a public hearing. The dockets are public. The bills are public. The thing that was hidden was the asking. Nobody asked us, and our checks cleared every month for seventeen years."
METHOD · HOW WE BUILT THIS BRIEF
Source layer. The CWIP authorization date, original cost estimate, and final cost figure are FACT-tier from Georgia Power's PSC filings and Southern Company's SEC disclosures. The Vogtle Units 3 and 4 commercial operation dates are FACT from Georgia Power press releases. The six-state CWIP-nuclear count is REPORTED from IEEFA's multi-year survey.
Personal calculator (Exhibit C). The cumulative cost-per-customer model uses the PSC-approved NCCR tariff schedule applied to typical monthly usage. The model is calibrated against the cumulative figures reported in PSC reconciliation filings. Individual results will vary based on actual rate class, usage profile, and tariff history. This is a reasoned forecast for illustration, not a per-account audit.
Fulton anchor figure. The "approximately 1 million Georgia Power customers in Fulton County" figure is REPORTED from utility-disclosed service-territory population data; the precise customer count varies and is best treated as an order-of-magnitude figure rather than a precise headcount.
Pull-quote. The closing pull-quote is an Infera paraphrase summarizing the spirit of the 2017 Public Interest Advocacy Staff dissent on the Vogtle cost-overrun reconciliation. It is not verbatim. The original filing is on the PSC public docket and the actual text differs in phrasing.
SOURCES · ALL PRIMARY OR PUBLIC RECORD
- Georgia Senate Bill 31 of 2009 (CWIP authorization). The state legislation authorizing Construction Work In Progress cost recovery for Vogtle Units 3 and 4. Georgia General Assembly
- Georgia Public Service Commission Vogtle docket series. The chain of dockets approving cost recovery, reconciliation, and rate adjustments for Vogtle Units 3 and 4 from 2009 forward. PSC Docket Search
- Georgia Power Company PSC filings. Construction monitoring reports, NCCR tariff filings, and cost reconciliation testimony filed by Georgia Power through the Vogtle construction period. PSC Filings
- Southern Company SEC filings. 10-K and 10-Q disclosures covering Vogtle construction cost, financing, and recovery from 2009 forward. Southern Company SEC EDGAR
- Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA). Multi-year survey of state-by-state CWIP authorization for nuclear construction; foundation for Exhibit B Question 1. IEEFA
- Public Interest Advocacy Staff testimony. Dissents and direct testimony filed by PIA Staff on Vogtle dockets from 2009 through 2024. PSC PIA Staff
- Georgia Power service-territory data. Public utility disclosures describing customer count by county for Fulton and surrounding metro Atlanta jurisdictions. Georgia Power
- Reuters and S&P Global coverage of Vogtle final cost figures and commercial operation timeline. Reuters
- Plant Vogtle Units 3 and 4 commercial operation announcements. Georgia Power press releases on the July 2023 commercial start of Unit 3 and the 2024 commercial start of Unit 4.
- Mechanism Series cross-references. EP 07 The Physical Plant · The Capital Stack · Brief 003 PA PUC.