Southern Ga. Vogtle 2 reactor up to 90 pct power

NEW YORK, Oct 27 (Reuters) - Southern Co's (SO.N) 1,149-megawatt Unit 2 at the Vogtle nuclear power station in Georgia ramped up to 90 percent power by early Monday, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission said in a report.

On Friday, the unit was operating at 27 percent of capacity after exiting a refueling outage earlier in the week.

The unit shut by Sept. 14 for a refueling outage.

The unit last shut for refueling from March 4-April 23, 2007. It is on an 18-month refueling cycle.

The 2,301 MW Vogtle station is in Waynesboro in Burke County about 105 miles southwest of Columbia, South Carolina. There are two units at the station: the 1,152 MW Unit 1, which entered service in 1987, and Unit 2 which entered service in 1989.

Unit 1 continued to operate at full power.

One MW powers about 500 homes in Georgia.

Southern's Southern Nuclear Operating Co Inc subsidiary operates the station for its owners: Southern's Georgia Power (45.7 percent), Oglethorpe Power Corp (30 percent), Municipal Electrical Authority of Georgia (22.7 percent) and the City of Dalton (1.6 percent).

In March 2008, the NRC approved a 1.7 percent up-rate for the two reactors. Workers installed equipment to up-rate Unit 1 during the spring and Unit 2 during this refueling outage.

In June 2007, Southern filed with the NRC for a 20-year extension of the units' original 40-year operating licenses.

The NRC expects to make a decision on the license renewal in about 23 months (June 2009) without a hearing and about 30 months (Jan. 2010) with a hearing.

NEW REACTORS

In 2006, Southern Nuclear, on behalf of the Vogtle owners, filed with the NRC for an early site permit to build two new reactors at Vogtle.

In March 2008, Southern Nuclear filed with the NRC to build the two reactors at Vogtle.

In April 2008, Georgia Power, Toshiba Corp (6502.T)/Shaw Group Inc's (SGR.N) Westinghouse Electric Co and Shaw's Stone & Webster Inc subsidiary agreed to build two of Westinghouse's 1,100 MW AP1000 reactors at Vogtle.

In August, Georgia Power filed an energy plan with the Georgia Public Service Commission that included a request to build the two reactors at Vogtle. Georgia Power expects the PSC to vote on the proposal in March 2009.