Southern Company SO recently announced that Unit 2 of the Alvin W. Vogtle Electric Generating Plant has resumed operations. The plant, which is located close to Waynesboro, GA, has been out of operations for scheduled refueling and maintenance activities since Mar 6. After the interruption of service, the unit started generating electricity since Mar 28.
Most importantly, the company has made considerable investments during the outage to implement upgrades on the systems and components. This is likely to boost efficiency and reliability which in turn will help the plant to generate clean, safe and affordable nuclear energy over a period of 18 months. Notably, 1,100 additional workers were brought in for the maintenance and refueling services.
The previous refueling services were done at Unit 2 during fall 2014 while Unit 1 was generating electricity in a safe and reliable way.
Headquartered in Atlanta, GA, Southern Company is one of the largest electric utility holding companies in the U.S., and serves the booming Southeast market, which is considered to be an advantageous region to operate in, owing to the higher-than-average natural population growth, the strong and diverse regional economy, constructive regulation and comparatively tight power markets.
The company continues to earn returns that are among the highest in the industry, while at the same time maintaining its position as a low-cost provider of electricity with superior customer satisfaction levels. Additionally, Southern Company remains a leader in power plant productivity, cost control and new technology research.
However, with approximately a third of the company’s total retail sales coming from industrial customers, a sluggish economy severely affects its fortunes.
As a result, the company carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold), implying that it will perform in line with the broader U.S. equity market over the next one to three months.
Meanwhile, better-ranked players in the energy sector include Atlantic Power Corporation AT, Black Hills Corporation BKH and CMS Energy Corp. CMS. Atlantic Power sports a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), while Black Hills and CMS Energy carry a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy).
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