NextEra Energy laid out a detailed blueprint for capturing hyperscale demand, telling investors on December 8 it is targeting 50 GW of large-load opportunities, anchored by new data center hubs powered by gas, nuclear, renewables and storage.

Brian Bolster, president and CEO of NextEra Energy Resources, said the company now sees “50 gigawatts of opportunities in various stages of readiness,” positioning the nation’s largest energy-infrastructure developer to serve hyperscalers through an unprecedented wave of power demand.

Bolster described the accelerating shift toward “bring your own generation,” or BYOG, where hyperscalers finance and procure their own power plants. “Hyperscalers can solve that problem by bringing and paying for their own power generation and infrastructure,” CEO John Ketchum said earlier in the day, noting that utilities’ excess capacity has largely evaporated.

Ketchum said the company’s base plan includes 15 GW of new generation for data center hubs by 2035, but that “we’ll be disappointed if we don’t do more,” adding that upside could reach 30 GW as hyperscale demand deepens. “We have already identified 20 potential hubs and expect to grow our opportunity set to over 40 by the end of 2026,” Bolster said.

20 GW of new gas build

A major component of the hyperscale strategy is gas-fired generation. Bolster said NextEra has about 20 GW of new gas opportunities across 11 states and has already secured 4 GW of GE Vernova turbine slots to support near-term development.

Ketchum added confidence about equipment and labor availability: “When you think about the EPC contractors that we would do business within that space; they’re the same folks we’ve been doing business with for 20 years… I don’t worry about getting our hands on turbines.”

6 GW of nuclear co-location, SMR land positions

Bolster called nuclear “a premium product” for hyperscalers, noting that the company has 1.7 GW of capacity available for recontracting at its Point Beach and Seabrook nuclear plants, and that hyperscale interest is strong.

He also highlighted “six gigawatts of co-location opportunities at our nuclear sites”, plus additional greenfield sites where the company holds land suitable for advanced small modular reactors (SMRs). “We’re laser-focused on developing the SMR opportunity… We have the ability to build at greenfield sites in our land positions throughout the country,” he said.

Bolster highlighted one nuclear location in particular — the Duane Arnold site in Iowa, where Google entered into a PPA to recommission the plant.

Partnerships with Comstock, Basin Electric and Exxon

NextEra’s hub strategy is anchored by several large partnerships:

• Comstock Resources (Texas): Up to 8 GW of new gas and storage. “This site has been able to deliver multiple gigawatts at scale in two to three years… We’re currently in negotiations with a hyperscaler to be the anchor tenant,” Bolster said.

• Basin Electric (North Dakota): A 1.5 GW combined-cycle gas plant anchoring a multi-GW data center campus, with renewables and storage expansion potential. “We think this region is going to be very attractive to the hyperscaler community,” Bolster said.

• ExxonMobil (Southeast US): A joint framework to develop a 1.2 GW carbon-abated gas plant using Exxon’s CO₂ pipeline network. “We’ll jointly market this 1.2-gigawatt site to hyperscalers in Q1… We think this is going to turn out to be an attractive site,” Bolster said.

Beyond new build, Bolster said NextEra expects 6 GW of repowering and 7.5 GW of recontracting opportunities through 2032, reflecting the shift to a higher-priced PPA environment. “As those PPAs start to expire… recontracting will command a much higher price,” he said.

Bolster also outlined plans to expand NextEra Energy Transmission from a USD 8bn business into a USD 30bn utility by 2035, driven by competitive buildouts and partnerships such as its recently awarded USD 1.7bn PJM 765-kV project with Exelon. “That is a small utility that’s about to get a whole lot bigger,” he said.

*This story was originally published exclusively for NPM subscribers.