Feb 25 (Reuters) - U.S. electric and gas utility Public Service Enterprise Group PEG.N on Tuesday forecast a higher profit for 2025 than the year earlier and raised its five-year capital spending plan to meet growing demand for power.

Utilities have witnessed a surge in demand for power, as Big Tech pours in billions of dollars into developing artificial intelligence technologies and the infrastructure needed to support them.

PSEG now expects to spend $22.5 billion to $26 billion over 2025 to 2029, an increase of $3.5 billion from its prior five-year plan.

The updated capital expenditure plan is expected keep the company's long-term, compound annual growth rate for adjusted earnings steady at 5% to 7% through 2029.

Many of PSEG's peers have also added tens of billions of dollars to spending plans for building new power supplies and bolster the grid as data centers for AI and cloud computing drive up energy demand.

According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, power consumption in the country is expected to reach record highs in 2025.

PSEG expects its current-year adjusted profit to be between $3.94 and $4.06 per share, the midpoint of which is about 9% higher than the 2024 earnings.

The company provides electric and gas services to about 4.3 million customers across New Jersey. It also operates nuclear-generating assets through its PSEG Power segment.

The Newark, New Jersey-based company posted an adjusted profit of 84 cents per share for the three months ended December 31, compared with analysts' average estimate of 83 cents, according to data compiled by LSEG.

Shares of the company rose 1.6% in premarket trading.

(Reporting by Vallari Srivastava in Bengaluru; Editing by Shilpi Majumdar)

((Srivastava.Vallari@thomsonreuters.com;))