Overview
Cohen Milstein is representing hourly employees of Constellation Energy, Dominion Energy, Duke Energy, Pacific Gas & Electric Company, NextEra Energy, Inc., Florida Power & Light Company, and 20 more of the country’s largest nuclear power generation companies for allegedly conspiring to fix and suppress their compensation.
Plaintiffs, who consist of nuclear operators, nuclear engineers, and nuclear technicians, claim that starting as early as May 2003 these companies, which employ hundreds of thousands of employees across the country, implemented, monitored, and enforced this wage fixing and compensation suppression scheme through a series of overt acts, including:
- Secret collective bargaining agreement repository.
- Compensation comparison reports.
- Annual meetings and direct communications.
Plaintiffs also allege that Accelerant Technologies LLC and Human Resource Consultants, LLC, two consulting companies, helped the defendants exchange this compensation data. Furthermore the Nuclear Human Resources Group, a U.S./Canadian industry-specific human-resources association, provided the organizational structure through which the defendants and coconspirators implemented the conspiracy.
Important Rulings
- On August 18, 2025, Judge Adam B. Abelson for the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland appointed Cohen Milstein Co-Lead Class Counsel.
Case Background
The defendants named in this putative class action operate nuclear power plants that collectively produce all the nuclear-generated electricity sold to consumers in the United States. The two named consulting companies, Accelerant Technologies LLC and Human Resource Consultants, LLC, which allegedly helped the Nuclear Defendants exchange compensation data and conduct in-person meetings to align compensation.
The defendants and their related entities own and/or operate all 54 commercial nuclear power plants in the United States and employed hundreds of thousands of Class Members at those plants. Those class members include nuclear operators, nuclear engineers, and nuclear technicians.
According to the complaint, the defendants compensated class members with hourly wages or annual salaries, supplemental forms of monetary compensation such as shift premiums and bonuses, and employment benefits.
Allegedly, the defendants established schedules for hourly wages, annual salaries, other monetary compensation, and employment benefits based on the specific positions and years of experience of the class members. This regimented process for determining compensation allowed the defendants to compare compensation rates—and collectively suppress compensation—across their workforces.
Multiple confidential witnesses, including a former HR executive employed by Progress and Duke, the Nuclear Defendants “collaborated” and compensation decisions were “never made in a silo.” The witness said that nuclear power companies would “all work together to make sure [they] were in alignment” on compensation. The explicit purpose of this coordination was to avoid paying higher-than-necessary compensation to employees. The witness explained: “we didn’t want to pay outrageous salaries.” Similarly, a former HR executive at Exelon said: “There’s no doubt in my mind there was a lot of collaboration and information sharing between many big nuclear companies in regards to union details.” He explained that nuclear power companies exchanged compensation information “all the time” and did so “to screw the union.”
Each Nuclear Defendant was a member of the Nuclear Human Resources Group (“NHRG”), which was a human-resources association that consisted of all the nuclear power companies in the United States and Canada. NHRG provided the organizational structure through which the Nuclear Defendants and coconspirators implemented the conspiracy, including facilitating information exchanges, organizing conferences, and maintaining contact lists.
Allegedly, the defendants implemented, monitored, and enforced their conspiracy to fix and suppress compensation paid to class members through a series of overt acts, including:
- Secret Collective Bargaining Agreement Repository.
- Compensation Comparison Reports.
- Annual Meetings to Exchange Compensation Information and Suppress Wages.
- Direct Telephone and Email Coordination Concerning Compensation. The Nuclear
The nuclear power industry has numerous characteristics that facilitated the formation and implementation of this conspiracy. These characteristics include but are not limited to: (1) extraordinarily high barriers to entry; (2) industry concentration; (3) fungibility of nuclear power generation labor; (4) inelastic labor supply; (5) numerous opportunities to collude; and (6) a history and culture of collaboration across the industry.
Plaintiffs claim that the defendants engaged in this conspiracy to increase their profits by reducing labor costs.
Furthermore, plaintiffs claim that the agreement entered by defendants to fix and suppress compensation paid to employees who worked in nuclear power generation has unreasonably restrained trade in violation of the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1.