Commitments

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2020

Commitments and Contingencies Disclosure [Abstract]

Commitments

Commitments:

We have entered into long-term commitments to meet fuel, transportation, maintenance and asset retirement requirements.

To supply a portion of the fuel requirements to our co-owned generating units, Georgia Power, on our behalf for coal and Southern Nuclear on our behalf for nuclear fuel, have entered into various long-term commitments for the procurement of coal and nuclear fuel. The contracts in most cases contain provision for price escalations, minimum and maximum purchase levels and other financial commitments. The value of the coal commitments is based on maximum coal prices and minimum volumes as provided in the contracts and does not include taxes, transportation, government impositions or railcar costs.

We have entered into long-term agreements with various counterparties to provide firm natural gas transportation to our natural gas-fired facilities. The value of these agreements is based on fixed rates as provided in the contracts and does not include variable costs.

We have also entered into long-term maintenance agreements for certain of our natural gas-fired facilities. In most cases, these agreements include provisions for price escalation and performance bonuses and, if applicable, are included in the values; timing of expenditures is based on current operational assumptions. Certain agreements contain significant cancellation for convenience penalties and, therefore, amounts in the table below include total estimated expenditures over the life of the agreement. If these agreements were terminated by us in 2021 for convenience, our cancellation obligation would be approximately $54,007,000.

We have asset retirement obligations which are legal obligations to retire long-lived assets. These obligations are primarily for the decommissioning of our nuclear units and coal ash ponds. Expenditures are based on estimates determined through decommissioning studies and include provisions for price escalation and other factors. See Note 1h for information regarding our asset retirement obligations.

We have a small portfolio of leases with the most significant being a finance lease for our 60% undivided interest in Scherer Unit No. 2. In addition, we have other operating leases including railcar leases for the transportation of coal at our coal-fired plants and various other leases of minimal value. For information regarding these leases, see Note 6.

As of December 31, 2020, our estimated commitments are as follows:

	(dollars in thousands)
	Coal		Nuclear Fuel		Gas Transportation		Maintenance Agreements		Asset Retirement Obligations		Finance and Operating Leases
2021	$	5,168	$	73,500	$	63,385	$	14,429	$	17,821	$	16,068
2022	3,017		33,060		53,268		14,896		31,780		15,878
2023	—		17,340		48,707		3,325		34,372		15,657
2024	—		22,650		48,034		30,316		41,840		15,183
2025	—		11,250		46,350		43,212		74,077		15,021
Thereafter	—		15,930		746,160		176,751		3,400,140		41,595