NextEra Energy, one of the largest electric companies in the US, is in talks to acquire Virginia-based Dominion Energy. FORCE has learned that a deal, which would primarily be a stock transaction, could be announced in the coming days. NextEra includes a regulated utility company serving approximately 6 million customers in Florida. The company also has an unregulated unit focused on renewable energy. He Financial timesIn a report after markets closed on May 15, it said the two utilities were talking about a deal. The newspaper also said the deal could fail. Neither utility had commented on the possibility of a deal as of late May 17. NextEra has a market value of almost $195 billion. Both utilities have been involved in transactions related to increased power demand from data centers; NextEra has a deal with Google tied to the restart of the Duane Arnold nuclear plant in Iowa. Dominion has a market capitalization of around $54 billion. The utility serves about 4 million customers in Virginia (where many current U.S. data centers are located) and the Carolinas. FactSet has said NextEra is the largest U.S. utility by market value, and is worth nearly twice as much as Southern Co., the next largest utility, which has a market capitalization of about $104 billion. Any deal between NextEra and Dominion would be subject to regulatory approval. This story will be updated. —David Proctor is a senior editor at POWER.