Tag Archives: Dominion

Is Dominion Campaigning Behind a Front Again?

Posted on May 27, 2023 by | 21 comments

By Steve Haner

An electric power industry lobbying and public relations group which has been financially supported by Dominion Energy Virginia is mailing out flyers to voters praising legislative incumbents who helped Dominion pass favorable legislation this year.

A mailer supporting incumbent Fairfax Democratic Senator George Barker caused the Democrat blog Blue Virginia to respond with anger Friday. What appeared to be the same message appeared in mailboxes in the district of Henrico Republican Senator Siobhan Dunnavant. How many other incumbents received the mailer may not be known until the group reports its campaign spending.

If it actually does report the mailers as campaign donations.  Barker is in a very contested party primary June 20, but Dunnavant is not on the ballot until November. The mailer merely “thanks” them for “delivering energy savings for Virginia.” Votes are not directly solicited.

If anybody has received the mailer in support of a Virginia legislator who did not seek a new term, please note that in the comment section. Odds are only legislators seeking new terms got the flyer, one more sign it’s basically a campaign donation, not a legitimate “thank you.”

The group is called Power for Tomorrow and is based in Arlington. The Energy and Policy Institute, a non-profit that often clashes with the utilities over policy, notes that a donation of about $800,000 to Power for Tomorrow appears on a 2021 Dominion disclosure form. A few years back Power for Tomorrow apparently sent out mail in Virginia focused on energy regulation issues, but without using the names or photographs of individual candidates. That drew fire from Ivy Main of the Sierra Club, also reported in 2021 on Blue Virginia. Continue reading →

21 Comments

Posted in Elections, Energy, Politics, Utilities

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First Lawsuit Over Whales and Wind Dismissed

Posted on May 25, 2023 by | 30 comments

Vineyard Wind 1, Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard. Click for larger view.

By Steve Haner

A federal district judge in Massachusetts has rejected an effort to stop an offshore wind project near Nantucket Island on the basis of danger to whales, apparently the first court test of similar claims being raised against wind turbine proposals along the U.S. eastern seaboard, including here in Virginia.

On May 17, U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani granted a motion for summary judgement to the federal agency that approved the Vineyard Wind One project. With a planned 84 turbines, the project is about half the size of Dominion Energy Virginia’s planned project off Virginia Beach. Both are just the first phases of larger planned buildouts.

Plaintiffs, mainly a group of residents of the islands near the project, had also cross-filed for summary judgement and that motion was denied. Other court challenges to the project, including one brought by fishing industry interests claiming potential economic harm, are pending, but work on the project has not stopped.  Major turbine components are starting to arrive for work to begin. Continue reading →

30 Comments

Posted in Energy, Environment, Regulation, Utilities

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Dominion Seeks Permit to Harass 100s of Whales

Posted on May 23, 2023 by | 18 comments

Click for larger view. BOEM map of Right Whale density noting offshore wind lease areas. Dominion’s CVOW and Avangrid’s Kitty Hawk Wind are the southernmost mapped.

By David Wojick

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is taking public comments on a massive proposal to harass large numbers of whales and other marine mammals off Virginia by building a huge offshore wind complex. There is supposed to be an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the proposed harassment, but it is not there with the proposal.

We are told it is elsewhere, but after searching we find that it simply does not exist. Like a shell game where the pea has been palmed, there is nothing to be found.

First, the bureaucratic background. The wind project is Dominion Energy Virginia’s 176-turbine offshore Virginia facility, which if built would be the world’s biggest to date. NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) is proposing to issue a five-year harassment authorization for the construction of this monster. This is about an enormous amount of pile driving, not just a sonar site survey, although there is more of that too.

Technically this is a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking. Here is the announcement:

NMFS has received a request from the Virginia Electric and Power Company, doing business as Dominion Energy Virginia (Dominion Energy), for Incidental Take Regulations (ITR) and an associated Letter of Authorization (LOA) pursuant to the Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA).

There is a handy comment button at the beginning, with the comment period ending June 5. I urge people to comment, especially along the lines discussed below. Continue reading →

18 Comments

Posted in Energy, Environment, Regulation, Utilities

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CVOW on Schedule and Budget, Utility Reports

Posted on May 11, 2023 by | 16 comments

Dominion’s proposed offshore wind project.

by Steve Haner

Dominion Energy Virginia’s first wave of offshore wind remains on schedule, and within the announced capital cost of $9.8 billion; and the cost per unit of the energy from the turbines will be lower than initially projected, the utility reported last week.

Details? Well, many of those are secrets. Much of the brief report the utility filed with State Corporation Commission remains redacted, with large blocks covered by black ink. The redacted data involves reports from an affiliate corporation, Blue Ocean Energy Marine LLC. There apparently is also another document “filed under seal under separate cover.”

Finally, Dominion refers to an Excel file that includes all the data on the new levelized cost of energy (LCOE) calculations which was posted to a shared eRoom. The password is available only to the SCC and case parties who signed non-disclosure agreements, reports the SCC’s communications director in response to a query about access for Bacon’s Rebellion.

Among the interesting items which are on the record: Continue reading →

16 Comments

Posted in Energy, Environment, Regulation, Utilities

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Combining RACs in Base Rates May Be “Bill Relief”

Posted on May 8, 2023 by | 5 comments

by Steve Haner

Simpler is usually better.  Monthly electric bills for many Virginians are about to get less complex, and in the short run also lower.  Will that lower cost be long term?  It is too soon to tell.

On July 1 Dominion Virginia Power will stop collecting separate monthly payments on its bills for three of its newer power plants, all now covered by their own stand-alone rate adjustment clauses or RACs.  This change flows from the major regulatory revision the General Assembly recently adopted and does not need State Corporation Commission approval.  Dominion instead notified the SCC of this change.

This is a different filing than the one about collecting its unpredicted fuel costs, and while they were announced together on May 1, really needed its own analysis. Continue reading →

5 Comments

Posted in Business and Economy, Energy, General Assembly, Regulation, Utilities

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Putting Off Paying Your Debt is Not “Bill Relief”

Posted on May 5, 2023 by | 12 comments

In this case, for us along with Popeye’s friend, “Tuesday” translates into “after the next election.”

by Steve Haner

Whether customers pay a lot more for one year starting this July, or just a little bit more for ten years starting next winter, Dominion Energy Virginia’s entire backlog of accumulated fuel costs from prior years will be paid in full.   Every dollar will come from customers, with annual interest tacked on in the case of the long-term approach.

The second approach, the “put it on the credit card and pay the minimum” approach, is not bill relief.  Paying less now in order to pay more for ten years is not bill relief.  It is bad enough that a major newspaper is helping to sell the con.  The story was then shared on Twitter as an example of “Republican-led utility reform,” and Democrats are likely to seek to claim credit, as well. Continue reading →

12 Comments

Posted in Business and Economy, General Assembly, Regulation, Utilities

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Enjoy the Blackouts — They’re Coming!

Posted on May 3, 2023 by | 23 comments

by James A. Bacon

The graph above shows the key trend driving the major revisions in Dominion’s 2023 Integrated Resource Plan, which Steve Haner describes in the previous post. The projections of peak summer electricity demand, based on PJM Interconnection forecasts, has been consistently revised upward, taking a dramatic jump higher in the 2023 iteration. The massive shift largely reflects changes in methodology but it also incorporates data showing that demand is increasing more rapidly than previously projected.

The demand projections underpinning the Virginia Clean Economy Act, which showed electricity demand decreasing somewhat, are a fantasy. It is impossible to reach zero net-carbon in the Dominion service territory by 2045 without putting Virginia’s electric grid at risk of catastrophic failure. Continue reading →

23 Comments

Posted in Energy

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Dominion’s New Plan Abandons Carbon Free Goal

Posted on May 3, 2023 by | 18 comments

Rendering of a GE combined-cycle natural gas-burning plant.  Despite demands from some for carbon free electricity, Dominion wants to add more gas generation in Virginia.

by Steve Haner

Dominion Energy Virginia has long been warning, albeit somewhat quietly, that the dream of running Virginia’s economy on nothing but solar, wind and battery power was not based on reality.  With the filing of its most recent integrated resource plan (IRP) on May 1, proposing how to meet customer needs out 25 years, it has made those warnings concrete.

The alternative plan that the company points to as preferred includes adding natural gas generation as early as 2028, an idea not even hinted at in the previous plan just a year ago. It wants to add 2,900 megawatts of new gas plants in all.  That proposal will prove anathema to the climate alarmism movement that imposed the Virginia Clean Economy Act just three years ago, demanding carbon-emissions-free electricity by 2045. Continue reading →

18 Comments

Posted in Energy, Environment, General Assembly, Regulation, Utilities

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SCC Agrees Dominion Must Own Most Wind, Solar

Posted on April 14, 2023 by | 7 comments

Dominion wins one for the shareholders.

By Steve Haner

The State Corporation Commission has rejected arguments that the Virginia Clean Economy Act would allow Virginia’s dominant electric utility to get more than 35% of its new wind, solar and battery power from third party suppliers. Dominion Energy Virginia is guaranteed by law (actually, required is the better word) to own 65% of those assets directly.

The ruling was issued today in the Commission’s final order on Dominion’s most recent application for additional solar and battery assets, most of which were approved.  The question has lingered through several recent cases since the General Assembly passed VCEA in 2020, with various stakeholders arguing that the third-party assets are usually cheaper for consumers and impose less risk from failure.

The lower cost of those alternative approaches was highlighted in this case and discussed earlier on Bacon’s Rebellion. Dominion had rejected several cheaper third-party choices in compiling its plan. That earlier story also touched on the dispute over whether the 35% referenced in the statute was a ceiling or a floor.  The SCC looked at the plain wording of the law in effect and declared it really is a target that cannot be ignored or exceeded. To wit:

This particular law is written as follows: “… and 35 percent of such generating capacity procured shall be from [third party-owned resources], with the remainder, in the aggregate, being from construction or acquisition by (Dominion.) As written, the above says “35%” – neither something more nor something less – “shall” be from third party-owned resources.

Continue reading →

7 Comments

Posted in Energy, Environment, General Assembly, Regulation, Utilities

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Youngkin Energy Reforms Killed Without Votes

Posted on April 13, 2023 by | 27 comments

By Steve Haner

Governor Glenn Youngkin’s proposal to ensure that any future wave of wind turbines built off Virginia must follow a real competitive bid process ended up dead as a beached whale. The General Assembly didn’t just kill his proposed amendment during its reconvened session April 12, it refused to even take up the matter.

Both the Republican-controlled House of Delegates and Democrat-controlled Senate voted to “pass by” the substitutes. The substitutes then died when the motion to adjourn was approved at the end of the day. Such a motion is often used to avoid a recorded vote loaded with political risk.

Rejection of the amendments, first discussed here, leaves Youngkin (R) free to veto the underlying bill (actually two identical bills, one in each chamber), but his argument was not with the underlying bills themselves. He was just trying to weaken Dominion Energy Virginia’s control over the wind development process, which has led to Virginia building the first and only $10 billion project with all the cost and risk on its ratepayers. At this point, any second phase will likely be the same.

The gubernatorial amendment on competitive bidding for offshore wind was injecting a new issue in the last stage of the 2023 session. Youngkin offered other amendments which constituted repeat efforts to pass things rejected during the regular part of the session. They met the same fate, some also by motions to pass by supported by his own party. Continue reading →

27 Comments

Posted in Energy, Environment, General Assembly, Regulation, Utilities

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Youngkin Seeks Bids on Future Offshore Wind

Posted on March 29, 2023 by | 14 comments

Dominion’s proposed offshore wind project. Phase two, similar in size, would build out to the east.

By Steve Haner

Governor Glenn Youngkin (R) has proposed a stronger requirement in state law that any second wave of offshore wind serving Virginia be subjected to a competitive procurement process, rather than simply allowing Dominion Energy Virginia to build it with all the costs and risks imposed on its customers.

The planned 176-turbine Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind (CVOW) project now under federal environmental review remains the only such project in the United States which is being developed directly by a monopoly utility. Other projects involve third-party developers raising the capital and taking on much of the financial risk for the multi-billion-dollar investments, then selling the power to utilities.

This is just one of several consumer-oriented amendments Youngkin proposed on a series of energy bills, to be voted on at the General Assembly’s reconvened session April 12. Should the Assembly reject his amendments, his option then is to either sign or veto the bill as it passed in February.

The financial and operational risk imposed on ratepayers by direct utility ownership of the wind farm was the focus of debate before the State Corporation Commission (SCC) finally authorized the project, now estimated to cost $10 billion. A method to shift some of the risk to the company’s shareholders if power output fell below projections was initially accepted but then abandoned by the regulators. Continue reading →

14 Comments

Posted in Energy, Environment, General Assembly, Regulation, Utilities

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Lower Bills? Green Energy Keeps Them Climbing.

Posted on March 20, 2023 by | 28 comments

by Steve Haner

Customer cost projections for compliance with the Virginia Clean Economy Act have increased again from the first such estimates made in 2020.  The bill for 1,000 kilowatt hours of electricity from Dominion Energy Virginia to power a home for a month may rise almost $100, or 83%, by 2035.

Dominion residential customers were already paying $288 (21%) more per year for 1,000 kilowatt hours per month by December 2022, compared to May 2020, just before VCEA became law.  That will cost another $547 annually by 2030 and $878 more by 2035.  Cost projections are even higher for commercial and industrial customers.

After all the hyped discussion coming out of the 2023 General Assembly that regulatory changes it made will “lower electricity bills,” it is important to face reality.  Ignore claims from any incumbents who say they voted to “lower bills.”  VCEA compliance is still going to be very expensive, and nothing just passed changes any of that.

The most recent figures are very similar and slightly higher than those reported in 2020.  They were filed last year by the utility as part of the annual VCEA compliance plan, outlining its planned conversion from fossil fuel generation to massive amounts of wind and solar power over the next two decades. Continue reading →

28 Comments

Posted in Energy, Environment, Regulation, Utilities

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“Cheap” Solar Costs More Than Offshore Wind?

Posted on March 17, 2023 by | 57 comments

Whether Dominion is building the solar farm or just buying its output makes a huge difference in cost.

by Steve Haner

In preparing for the latest round of new additions to its solar generation assets, Dominion Energy Virginia rejected eight privately- developed projects which were substantially cheaper than the projects it wanted to build on its own with ratepayer money. Just how much more expensive the company-owned projects will be is not clear, but the higher costs will be locked in for decades.

It is the 2020 Virginia Clean Economy Act which is driving the massive solar buildout, and one part of the statute is being read one way by the utility and another way by most of the other stakeholders. Dominion believes the law requires it to provide a fixed 35% of the new renewable electricity from third-party providers under long-term power purchase agreements (PPAs). It claims the law dictates that it must own 65% of the generation assets directly.

Just about every other party to the most recent application for new solar believes that 35% is a floor, a “no less than” target, and a higher percentage could be from PPAs. Entities taking that position include the Office of the Attorney General,  environmental activists, and even large electricity users such as Walmart. The issue dominates final arguments on the application filed this week at the State Corporation Commission.

What is the solar price differential? As with far too many of these disputes, most of the key financial information is confidential, available only to case participants who have filed a promise to maintain secrecy. But in its final brief, the staff for Attorney General Jason Miyares (R) provides some dramatic comparisons. Continue reading →

57 Comments

Posted in Energy, Environment, General Assembly, Regulation, Utilities

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Breaking Virginia’s Energy Impasse

Posted on March 8, 2023 by | 59 comments

by Bill O’Keefe

With the two chambers of the General Assembly politically divided, there is no hope for a bipartisan compromise on changing the Virginia Clean Economy Act. Without change, we are stuck with a radical energy policy that will enrich Dominion and leave consumers holding the bag. VCEA will stand as a monument to hubris.

There is one course of action that the Democrat-controlled Senate might be willing to accept, and that is subjecting Dominion’s approach to a “Red Team” review. If the GA can’t agree to do that type of review, the SCC could undertake it on its own.

The “Red Team” concept was developed by the Department of Defense to provide a means to realistically validate the strength and quality of strategies or policies by employing an outside perspective. A Red Team’s review evaluates whether a proposal is robust and complete. The use of red teaming has expanded broadly within government and the private sector.

Dominion and the Democrat Senate are by now so deeply committed to the offshore wind farm and to the VCEA mandates that it is impossible for either to take a fresh, objective look at either.

There are a number of reasons why a “Red Team” analysis is needed. Continue reading →

59 Comments

Posted in Energy

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SCC Oversight Restored, Don’t Expect Lower Bills

Posted on February 26, 2023 by | 20 comments

What Dominion is promoting as how to “save” you money while paying off its old fuel bills, with ten years of Tuesdays to pay. With interest.

by Steve Haner

The final version of a regulatory revision for Dominion Energy Virginia restores State Corporation Commission authority over the utility’s profit margin and rates, a major goal for Governor Glenn Youngkin (R). It was also the highest priority in a detailed energy policy put forward by the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy.

Of the aggressive goals set out in Dominion’s initial legislation, few were accomplished in the end. The General Assembly did agree to directly legislate a profit margin for the utility for two years, and it is an increase.  Come 2025 the SCC will be free to set the next profit rate without any reference to the peer group of other utilities now required by law. Continue reading →

20 Comments

Posted in Energy, General Assembly, Regulation, Utilities

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