Category: Utilities
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Feds: Whales Must Be Protected from Turbines
by Steve Haner First published this morning by the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy. Soon after a group of opponents to proposed East Coast offshore wind projects hired a law firm with environmental regulation expertise, the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) announced a new plan to protect North Atlantic Right Whales and…
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Batting Zero on Virginia Energy Policy Reset
by Steve Haner One year later, a series of energy policy goals for Virginia proposed by the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy remains just as valid and also remain unaccomplished. Gridlock has favored the flawed status quo. Compared to a year ago, more Virginians have awakened to the reality that they will soon be…
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SCC Urged To Focus on Wind Construction Risk
by Steve Haner Advocates made their case Monday for a proposed settlement that offers Virginia consumers some protection from construction cost overruns on Dominion Energy Virginia’s proposed offshore wind project. Not everybody said it was superior to an earlier proposal that protected consumers from future operational failures, but all saw it as unlikely to kill…
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East Coast Ocean Wind Projects Faltering
by Steve Haner In recent days several proposed offshore wind projects, which unlike Virginia’s are not guaranteed by captive ratepayers, are showing cracks in their pylons. Multinational developer Avangrid recently told Massachusetts regulators that its proposed 1.2 gigawatt Commonwealth Wind project is no longer economically viable. It seems to be seeking to renegotiate the power…
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Miyares Retreats from Wind Performance Standard
by Steve Haner First published this morning by the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy. The big risk with Dominion Energy Virginia’s planned offshore wind extravaganza has always been that either the wind out in the Atlantic blows too little or it blows too much. Too little and the ratepayers are paying an inordinate amount…
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Good Energy Plan But It Needs to Pass
by Steve Haner First published this morning by Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy. In his newly released energy plan, Governor Glenn Youngkin (R) makes it clear he sees the economic abyss created by the unrealistic and ideological green utopia demanded by his predecessor. Seeing a looming disaster and stopping it are two different things.…
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Legislators MIA on Wind Performance Standard
by Steve Haner In the ongoing debate over Dominion Energy Virginia’s proposed $10 billion offshore wind project, focus should remain on the people truly responsible for undercutting State Corporation Commission authority to protect consumers: the legislators who passed provisions in the code the utility interprets as a rubber stamp for its proposals.
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Coalition Exploring Lawsuit to Challenge CVOW
The following news release has been issued by the Thomas Jefferson Institute along with other coalition partners. A coalition of public interest groups – The Heartland Institute, the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT), and the American Coalition for Ocean Protection (ACOP) – announced in late September that it has hired counsel to explore a…
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SCC Can Set CVOW Wind Performance Standard
by Steve Haner First published this morning by the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy. Despite Dominion Energy Virginia’s complaints that the Virginia State Corporation Commission has exceeded its authority, a legal analysis provided by the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy finds that the SCC’s proposed performance standard for an offshore wind project is…
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Consequences of the Zero Carbon Fantasy
By Steve Haner First published this morning by the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy. Virginians may finally be waking up to the consequences of the headlong rush to adopt utopian energy policies under our previous governor. The issues are getting more attention than ever before, and now people need to realize that all the…
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When Politicians Run Power Companies
by Steve Haner Residential customers of Dominion Energy Virginia will soon be paying 55% more for electricity than they were when the Virginia General Assembly took over micromanaging utility regulation in 2007. The Western Virginia customers of Appalachian Power will have seen their electric bills rise by 92%. Underlying inflation for the period has been…
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Wall Street Journal: Wind Approved “Under Duress”
by Steve Haner With an editorial published yesterday, The Wall Street Journal has now given its readers more insight into the risks inherent in Dominion Energy Virginia’s coming wind project than any Virginia newspaper or broadcast outlet has. It is not the kind of national spotlight Virginia should crave.
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Wind: SCC Rejects Deal Signed By Its Staff
by Steve Haner First published this morning by the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy. Rejecting an agreement that its own staff reached with Dominion Energy Virginia, the State Corporation Commission has imposed at least some level of financial risk on the utility’s shareholders should its $10 billion offshore wind project fail to match the…
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Delayed Fuel Costs May Include Interest Now
by Steve Haner Dominion Energy Virginia wants its customers, not its shareholders, to pay an interest penalty for the privilege of taking three years to pay off the recent explosion in its fuel costs. The company is paying about $1 billion more for fuel than it planned when the fuel portion of bills was set…
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Bill to Bury Fauquier Powerline Comes to You
by Steve Haner One of the key skills in politics is to make your constituents happy with money provided from those far, far away. It is happening again as Fauquier County’s leaders want the General Assembly to force all Dominion Energy Virginia’s ratepayers to pay to bury a 230-kv power line out of sight from…