Author Archives: Steve Haner

Another Day, Another Load Aggregation Petition

Posted on February 28, 2019 | 22 comments

Efforts by large electricity customers to aggregate their locations into one account eligible to seek a competitive supplier suffered a setback in Monday’s ruling against one such petition.  But another set of petitioners was in a State Corporation Commission hearing room Wednesday taking another crack at it.

The petition rejected Monday was from Wal-Mart and Sam’s Stores.  The hearing yesterday involved 128 locations of grocery chains Kroger and Harris-Teeter, seeking to consolidate into one account in Dominion Energy Virginia territory with a peak demand of 45 megawatts.  The case record had been built and was ripe for a hearing, so on it went in front of a hearing examiner.  Continue reading →

22 Comments

Posted in Energy, Regulation

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Hanoi’s Most Hallowed Ground

Posted on February 27, 2019 | 19 comments

Source: Washington Times

I hope he doesn’t profane this hallowed place with his presence.  Apparently, the Vietnamese are using it for their own propaganda purposes, but it remains a memorial to great American heroes, whatever your views on that war.  Surely a man who passed on a trip to Belleau Wood will also stay away from the Hanoi Hilton.  Only those who understand that McCain and his comrades demonstrated years of daily heroism may enter.

19 Comments

Posted in Uncategorized

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SCC Decision Denying Aggregation Choice: Read It

Commentary - Posted on February 25, 2019 | 13 comments

 

Not at the table? Then you are on the menu.

Others will have this story and I like to post things on Bacon’s Rebellion which are unique.  But I do have something to add to today’s State Corporation Commission decision to deny Wal-Mart Stores permission to leave Virginia’s monopoly electric companies.  The short decision is worth reading.   Continue reading →

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Posted in Commentary, Energy, General Assembly, Regulation

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Tax Break Powers Opposition To Huge Solar Farm

Posted on February 25, 2019 | 17 comments

If the East Coast’s largest solar generation facility, proposed for Spotsylvania County, is rejected by its Board of Supervisors this week, one of the reasons will be the major tax advantages sought by that industry and granted by the General Assembly.

The tax exemption is at the heart of the final argument put forward by one of the opponents in Sunday’s Fredericksburg Free Lance-Star:

“Put plainly: Future tax revenues are going down, not up, if the project goes forward. A current estimate is that this $600 million project will only generate some $8 million over its lifetime and, as shown below, our current incremental expenses greatly exceed that,” wrote Alfred King, who lives in a neighboring subdivision but carefully avoids any not-in-my-backyard rhetoric.   Continue reading →

17 Comments

Posted in Energy, General Assembly, Land use & development, Taxes

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PG&E Efficiency Program’s Contrary Results

Posted on February 23, 2019 | 31 comments

From Opinion Dynamics report on PG&E’s Home Energy Report program, showing most in the program did not change their consumption of energy. Click for larger view.

Okay, for the wonks among you: At my request, the State Corporation Commission staff directed me to the full report on Pacific Gas and Electric’s Home Energy Report (HER) Program, which found that more people in the program increased their consumption of electricity and gas than decreased it. Continue reading →

31 Comments

Posted in Energy, Regulation

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Taking Some Pain Out of Eminent Domain

Posted on February 22, 2019 | 17 comments

Senator Frank Ruff of Clarksville. Taking some of the pain out of eminent domain.

Four successful bills heading for Governor Ralph Northam’s desk may combine into a measurable shift in Virginia’s condemnation laws in favor of the targeted landowners.  They may also spark a race to the courthouse between now and when some go into effect July 1.

The biggest financial impact may come from Senator Frank Ruff’s Senate Bill 1256, which eliminates state tax on any capital gain resulting from the forced sale.  The subtraction for any capital gain applies to both individual and corporate landowners and applies to any transaction after January 1 of this year.  Too bad if you took that check in December.   Continue reading →

17 Comments

Posted in Land use & development, Property rights, Taxes

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Three Lessons From Dominion’s Income Tax Case

Posted on February 21, 2019 | 7 comments

If you thought the tax conformity debate took too long at the General Assembly, check out the fight at the State Corporation Commission over Dominion Energy Virginia’s corporate income tax bill.  The SCC still hasn’t decided how much to cut Dominion’s base rates to reflect its lower income tax payments, but a decision is close.

There are three reasons why this case is worth exploring.   Continue reading →

7 Comments

Posted in Energy, Regulation, Taxes

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Fresh RAC Tracker Doesn’t Reflect What’s Coming

Posted on February 20, 2019 | 15 comments

Bill impact table included in SCC staff testimony on demand management programs case, showing impact of all pending Dominion requests. Click for larger view.

The State Corporation Commission staff has provided an updated version of a table tracking the possible rate impact of various Dominion Energy Virginia cases pending before the commission, most creating or adjusting rate adjustment clauses (RACs).  It starts with a baseline of $117.64 for the February monthly cost to that famous 1000-kilowatt hour typical customer, who of course does not exist.

The largest cost increases visible on the horizon are not included.

Some of the cases which are tracked have been decided and some are pending.  The table was included in the staff testimony about the proposed demand management programs paid for with Riders C1A and C2A and includes the $0.61 per month increase in them Dominion is requesting.   Continue reading →

15 Comments

Posted in Energy, Regulation

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But The Idea Is To Cut Power Use, Isn’t It?

Posted on February 19, 2019 | 26 comments

California’s giant Pacific Gas and Electric has a major program providing energy audits for its customers, and recently retained an outside firm to study the results.  While quite a few customers did reduce their energy usage after the audits, it turned out a larger number increased demand.

The report, dated December 2018, noted 19 percent of PG&E electricity customers reduced usage but 27 percent of them increased it following the audit.  On the natural gas side, 25 percent reduced usage and 31 percent increased.   Continue reading →

26 Comments

Posted in Energy

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Assisted Conception Option For The New Realities

Posted on February 16, 2019 | 5 comments

Rick Olson, Jay Timmons and children at their McLean home.

A major revision of Virginia’s assisted conception laws has fought its way through to a final vote in the State Senate Monday, pushed by a former Virginia official who has gone public with his unconventional and very 21st century family.

Jay Timmons and his husband Rick Olson faced a major legal battle in Wisconsin a few years back over the surrogacy agreement they had with the mother of their third child.  The child was conceived using a frozen embryo from a couple that had used a similar method to build a family of four, didn’t want to use the remaining embryos themselves, but also didn’t want them destroyed.   Continue reading →

5 Comments

Posted in Children and families, Culture wars, General Assembly

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Virginia Goes Wet With Nary A Whimper

Posted on February 15, 2019 | 4 comments

“Dry Messiah: The Life of Bishop James Cannon” by Virginius Dabney

It has only been a century since Prohibition was approved with ratification of the Eighteenth Amendment in 1919.  Is it finally over in Virginia?  For Virginia, a century is but a moment.  Are we rushing this?

A bill is sitting on Governor Ralph Northam’s desk that would not have been successful ten years ago, would have been political suicide fifty years ago and even now deserves attention.  It makes all Virginia localities wet, allowing ABC stories and mixed drinks in restaurants within their boundaries.  The 31 counties that remain dry or partially dry can only maintain their restrictions on demon rum if a local referendum approves continued prohibition.   Continue reading →

4 Comments

Posted in Regulation

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GA Bills You For Industrial Electricity Discount

Posted on February 13, 2019 | 7 comments

The people who make the real decisions about what we pay for electricity in Virginia, which would be the members of the General Assembly, have just cut electricity costs for large Dominion Energy Virginia customers by up to $10 million and shifted those costs over to other customer classes, including residential.

This is yet another small but significant gift to you from the 2018 Ratepayer Bill Transformation Act, which really had little to do with transforming Virginia’s electricity distribution grid.  Dominion’s plans for the grid remain stalled, but this little add-on provision from the same legislation just got approved by the State Corporation Commission on February 8.   Continue reading →

7 Comments

Posted in Energy, Regulation

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Revised Again, Tax Bill Envisions Future Reforms

Posted on February 12, 2019 | 8 comments

The possibility of additional future state tax reform or tax cuts improved Monday under a new version of the pending bill that puts Virginia into conformity with the federal Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.  The resulting tax revenue not returned by the modest policy changes in this bill are to be held in reserve for future action.

The language in the bill now better matches the earlier rhetoric about preventing a huge inflow of new income tax revenue.

The legal reality is no General Assembly can bind a future one, so the 2020 session could disband this new fund and just spend the money.  But it is a stronger statement of policy and intent, and perhaps will add focus to the debate over tax policy which is inevitable in the 2019 legislative elections.  Continue reading →

8 Comments

Posted in General Assembly, Taxes

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You May Pay A North Carolinian’s Coal Ash Costs

Posted on February 11, 2019 | 16 comments

An illustration of the coal ash de-watering and treatment process at Bremo Bluff power station, which is now out of favor. Source: DEQ website.

The cost to Dominion Energy Virginia customers for recycling coal ash or moving it into more secure landfills is growing, because the proposed bill now recognizes that Dominion’s North Carolina electricity customers cannot be forced to pay by the Virginia General Assembly or the State Corporation Commission.

This phrase has been added to the current substitutes for House Bill 2786 and Senate Bill 1355: (v) any such costs that are allocated to the utility’s system customers outside of the Commonwealth that are not actually recovered from such customers shall be included for cost recovery from jurisdictional customers in the Commonwealth through the rate adjustment clause.  

Dominion Energy North Carolina’s customers in the northeastern part of that state depend on Virginia-based generation, including those coal plants, but the General Assembly so far seems fine with billing us for their share of these costs.  Why?  Absent that the company’s shareholders might have to pay it.   Continue reading →

16 Comments

Posted in Energy, Environment, General Assembly

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State Cap on Deductions Added To Tax Bill

Posted on February 9, 2019 | 10 comments

The compromise income tax bill hailed for preventing a tax policy train wreck in Virginia includes one new provision not included in earlier bills, not mentioned in any of the Republican press releases and not yet included in any fiscal impact statements.  Democrats wanted it.

It is yet another departure from the new federal Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.  The bill maintains a formula to reduce or cap itemized deductions known as the Pease limit.  TCJA removed the Pease limit at the federal level but the substitute tax bill voted on in committee Friday restores it at the state level.   Continue reading →

10 Comments

Posted in General Assembly, Taxes

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