Category: Regulations, Gov’t Oversight
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Youngkin Regulatory Reforms Saved $1.2 Billion a Year
by Hans Bader “With just 4 employees” in his regulatory office, Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin has “saved residents $1.2 billion per year” and “reduced cost of building a new house by $24,000,” by eliminating more than a quarter of Virginia’s regulations, says Dominic Pino of the National Review. Under Youngkin, “occupational license approval times declined…
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Youngkin Vetoes More Energy Bills, Again Criticizes Clean Economy Act
By Steve Haner, With one exception, Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin (R) has now vetoed the contested energy bills that he sought to amend at the 2025 General Assembly’s reconvened session last month. The rejection of his amendments or substitutes gave him a final opportunity for a full veto of the legislation. Friday night was his deadline…
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“Green” Mandates, Profit Demands Drive Dominion Price Hikes
By Steve Haner The pending price increase for electricity from Dominion Energy Virginia is higher than the 14% jump reported by the news media, which basically parroted company releases. Should all of Dominion’s current rate applications at the State Corporation Commission be approved, residents and businesses will pay about 20% more. The 1,000-kilowatt hour monthly bill…
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PJM Capacity Auction Costs Coming to Your Dominion Bill
By Steve Haner Dominion Energy Virginia has asked to increase the amount it charges customers for fuel by more than 50%, in part because the cost of that fuel has proven stubbornly high and in part because it now wants to charge us for its out-of-state capacity contracts using the same account as fuel. The…
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Taking a Knife to the Democrats’ Green Energy Dream
By Steve Haner Wielding irony like a razor-sharp butcher’s knife, Governor Glenn Youngkin (R) has proposed a series of amendments on bills intended to mandate renewable energy that basically reverse the impact and do just the opposite. One amendment would even repeal the 2020 Virginia Clean Economy Act (VCEA), which is central to Virginia Democratic…
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Big Pharma Greed — or Low Risk Tolerance?
by James A. Bacon “All over this country, the American people are asking why it is that they pay, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs?” Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders noted in a screed published a couple of years ago. “Why is it that nearly one out of every four adults…
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Two Energy Updates: RGGI and an Offshore Wind Reversal
The Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative held its latest auction for carbon emission allowances last week and produced a price of $19.76 per ton. Because Virginia is no longer a participant, that probably saved electric utility customers another $100 million. The March 2025 price, in reality a tax on the use of hydrocarbon fuels, was lower…
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Blame the Nurses — or the Nursing-Home Profiteers?
by Jim Wright So, who’s the real culprit? Eighteen nurses were recently arrested at Colonial Heights Nursing Home, charged with elder abuse and falsification of records. Surely, there was wrongdoing here, but does the blame belong to 18 nurses only? In my experience as a nursing-home medical director, I’ve learned that sometimes the first “culprit”…
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Virginia’s Nursing Homes and the Courts
by James C. Sherlock Readers have stuck with me for a long time as I have reported on the dire state of many of Virginia’s nursing homes. Recently the employees of one of the worst have been charged with abuse and neglect in the death of a patient. Her suffering was what can only…
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Dominion’s IRP Becoming Moot as Federal Rules Pivot
by Steve Haner The expanded use of natural gas as a fuel for electricity is the key debate in Dominion Energy Virginia’s integrated resource plan pending before the State Corporation Commission. Not waiting for the decision in that case to come later this year, the utility has now filed an application to start building the…
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A Good Week for FERC and America’s Energy Reliability
by Steve Haner The new chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission used the Trump Administration’s order to have agency employees report their activities as a chance to show off. Late last week the chairman issued a four-page letter of accomplishments on behalf of his staff, a list that might be a good month, not…
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VanValkenburg Takes Another Crack at Affordable Housing
by James A. Bacon I’m beginning to think that Senator Schuyler VanValkenburg, D-Henrico, is my favorite Democrat. Admittedly, my list of Democrats whose policies I like is a short one, so it’s not a high bar to clear. But I’d go one step further. VanValkenburg is generating ideas to address affordable housing that could be…
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Time to Come Clean on Clean Economy Act Costs to Customers
By Steve Haner Until October of last year, customers of Dominion Energy Virginia could see at least some of the higher costs created by the Virginia Clean Economy Act (VCEA) detailed on their electric bills. Look at the recent bill and all that transparency is gone and the VCEA costs are now hidden. Compliance with the…
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Data Centers Escape Assembly Session Unscathed
By Steve Haner Despite great public angst and political theater, the data center industry has emerged from the 2025 General Assembly unscathed. Virginians will continue to compete with Internet and cloud customers from all over the country and the world for electricity, as the data centers continue to proliferate here. One bill dealing with the…
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Key Energy Issues of Customer Cost, Reliability Often Ignored
By Steve Haner The Virginia General Assembly has approved a long list of bills to reinforce its previous commitment to ending the use of hydrocarbon fuel in Virginia. It ignored warnings that natural gas is essential for energy security from the regional electricity marketplace, the Virginian who now chairs the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and…