Good news at Georgia Power’s McDonough-Atkinson plant in Smyrna, Georgia – they successfully validated a 20% hydrogen blend with their Mitsubishi M501G gas turbine at both partial load and full load.  To date, this is the largest test of its kind and the 20% blend provided a roughly 7% cut in carbon emissions when compared to natural gas emissions alone. 

The McDonough-Atkinson plant, not far from downtown Atlanta, was converted to natural gas in 2012 and currently operates six M501G series gas turbines with a combined generating capacity of 2,520 MW. and three steam turbines operating in three blocks of 2-in-1 combined-cycle configuration.

In addition, EPRI (Electric Power Research Institute) researchers were present during the tests, and they are expected to release a report on the results later this summer