NEW YORK (Reuters) - Talen Energy is focused on capturing surging demand from data center developers as the independent power company looks to pivot away from its crypto mining operation, company executives said on a conference call on Tuesday.

Talen is among a group of U.S. electric companies benefiting from the power needs of artificial intelligence and cloud computing data centers, with shares of the company rising nearly 100% since the start of the year.

Reuters reported this month that Talen was in a process to sell its bitcoin mining center at the site of a Pennsylvania nuclear power plant

"It's not a strategic asset for us and we are looking at what are the other alternatives with respect to coin," Talen Energy Chief Executive Officer Mark McFarland said on a second-quarter earnings call.

Talen raised its earnings and free cash flow forecasts for the year as it benefits from higher power use and prices, bigger payments from the regional grid operator PJM and a payout for a data center sold to Amazon early this year.

(Reporting by Laila Kearney; Editing by Emelia Sithole-Matarise)