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Brunswick County Power Station Recognized

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James A. Bacon
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Brunswick County Power Station honored as "Project of the Year"
Brunswick County Power Station

Dominion Virginia Power’s Brunswick County Power Station has received “Project of the Year” honors from Power Engineering magazine in recognition of its technological innovation, local impact, capacity, and logistical challenges and innovation. Commissioned in April 2016, the combined-cycle natural gas-fired electricity plant is expected to provide 9% of Dominion’s total energy requirements in its first full year of operation.

The power plant combines three state-of-the-art Mitsubishi Hitachi Power Systems combustion turbines and a fourth generation unit that runs off the waste heat. Additionally, a 140-foot-tall air-cooled condenser, the largest in the U.S., significantly reduces water consumption. Working under strict air emissions standards, the facility produces electricity with half the carbon as power purchased from the regional grid when operating on peak.

Writes Power Engineering of the plant’s logistical challenges:

Project components were delivered by ship and rail from three continents: North America, Europe, and Asia. For final nighttime delivery to the site, local roads and bridges were temporarily reinforced to accommodate the project’s heaviest load, which exceeded 100,000 pounds. The project also weathered Hurricane Joaquin, which dumped 5.84 inches of rainfall at the site in 10 days. Despite these logistical constraints, the project was completed ahead of schedule and under budget.

For the moment, the Brunswick County Power Station is one of the most cost-efficient gas-fired power stations in the world, although power plants using next-generation turbines, like the one under construction in Greensville County, will be even more efficient. Dominion estimates that the plant will save rate payers roughly $1 billion over the 40- to 50-year life of the project. The Mitsubishi Hitachi turbines burn gas at higher temperatures, which allows them to extract more energy from the same volume of fuel while polluting less. Additionally, by having access to two gas pipelines — Transco and the Atlantic Coast Pipeline, assuming the ACP receives federal approval — the Brunswick plant will enjoy more flexibility than most gas-fired plants to purchase the lowest-cost natural gas.

Innovations in natural gas extraction and combustion technology continue to drive down the cost of electricity, and Virginia rate payer are the beneficiaries.

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2 responses to “Brunswick County Power Station Recognized”

  1. LarrytheG Avatar
    LarrytheG

    well no matter what folks think about Dominion’s motivations – you cannot argue that they are not willing to put their (investors and ratepayers) money where their mouth is!!!

    then again – who pays if they have gambled wrong?

    I’m pretty surprised in a way after reading various analyses about how long shale gas will last until depleted.. Dominion must think more is going to be found… or that even if supplies get scarce that there will still be enough available to generate electricity.

    And .. if I were a betting man – I’d bet on Dominion’s bet on natural gas before I’d bet on those who think storage is about to become cheap.

    You can make gas go a long-long way if you use it as a backup fuel to solar … and we build more and more solar.. to use instead of gas.

  2. TomH Avatar
    TomH

    As far as conventional power generation goes, Dominion does a good job and this plant is a fine example of that and the Greensville plant will be even better.

    I am still concerned about claims in the media about huge savings to ratepayers when there is no disclosure about what that is compared to. The plant is not a cheaper source of energy than solar because the solar is slightly cheaper now and the cost of energy from a solar facility will remain fixed over its life. The energy costs from one of these new combined cycle plants will only increase as fuel gets more expensive. So how does that save ratepayers money?

    Attaching the plant to the ACP offers no advantage in terms of gaining access to the lowest-priced natural gas. Transco already has access to the cheapest source of gas in the Marcellus. Transco can also access lower-priced off-season gas from the Gulf Coast. The ACP can only do that because it connects to Transco. If it came to pass that natural gas from the Dominion South Hub in West Virginia was cheaper than either of these sources, it could be available through the WB XPress/Columbia Gas line, which takes it supply from that area. Gas from this source could be transferred to Transco using the Columbia Gas/Transco connection in northern Virginia and transported to Virginia and the Carolinas. The ACP offers no advantage to the existing pipelines in having access to lower cost sources of supply and adds significantly higher costs of transportation.

    Innovations in combustion technology have made these new plants more efficient than the old ones but the low-priced natural gas exists because supply outstrips demand. Drilling efficiencies have only allowed some of the drilling companies to stay in business in this low-priced environment. Soon the most productive areas will be depleted and more gas will only be available at a higher price. The drilling innovations will keep this price lower than what it otherwise might have been. Higher LNG exports will bring the domestic gas prices closer to the world prices. We are frittering away a valuable resource for the sake of short-term profits.

    As advanced as these new plants are, without a revised regulatory scheme and innovations in grid management and price decreases in storage they may not be able to pay their way in 5-10 years.

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