Category: Energy
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CVOW on Schedule and Budget, Utility Reports
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…
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Hearing Held, No Vote Taken on Beach Wind Cables
by Steve Haner One four-hour public hearing was not enough. Virginia Beach City Council wants another such debate before it votes on a wind company’s request to bring power cables ashore at Sandbridge Beach. Last week’s hearing on Kitty Hawk North’s application for an easement to bury cables apparently was not covered by any Hampton…
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Combining RACs in Base Rates May Be “Bill Relief”
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…
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Nuclear Power “Essential” – Gates and Granholm
By James C. Sherlock Bill Gates and Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm demonstrated and published a joint position on nuclear energy nearly two years ago: “Nuclear power is the only carbon-free energy source we have that can deliver power day and night throughout any season, almost anywhere on earth. And it’s been proven to work…
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Good Questions About Nuclear Power Answered
by James C. Sherlock A reader asked two excellent questions: The issues with nuclear power have been: 1. The waste generated remains radioactive and dangerous for a very long time. 2. In the case of failure, a huge risk is exposed as was the case in Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and Fukishima. Do these new,…
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Westinghouse Joins the Small Nuclear Reactor Market
by James C. Sherlock Westinghouse, whose flagship AP1000 nuclear reactor is the American entry into the international market for large nuclear power plants, today announced a new reactor, called the AP300, which it claims will be available in 2027. It will generate about a third of the power of the AP1000 reactor. It is targeted…
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Clean Virginia’s Views on Small Modular (Nuclear) Reactors
By James C. Sherlock I wrote in an earlier article that I had reached out to Clean Virginia on its policy on Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) and had not received a response. Laura Gonzalez Guerrero, Clean Virginia’s energy policy lead, has been kind enough to contact me with that answer. She was out of the…
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Generation IV and V Technology Offer to Make Opposition to Nuclear Power a Historical Artifact
by James C. Sherlock We write here often about electric power in Virginia, but usually related to public utilities. We focus on Dominion and Appalachian Power. There is another big market: industrial power plants independent of utilities and the grid (and thus not requiring State Corporation Commission approval). Those are not reflected in the plans…
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Enjoy the Blackouts — They’re Coming!
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.…
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Dominion’s New Plan Abandons Carbon Free Goal
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…
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More Nuclear Power in Virginia?
by James C. Sherlock Where is Virginia going with nuclear power, the non-carbon energy source that works 24/7/365 to maintain grid stability for all those sources that do not? Where we are. Virginia has four nuclear reactors producing electric power — two at Surry station in Surrey County (produces 14% of Virginia’s electricity) and two…
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Residents Ask VA Beach to Reject Wind Easement
By Steve Haner Opposition to offshore wind is stirring in Virginia Beach, but the focus is on a North Carolina proposal that would bring its power ashore at Sandbridge Beach, not the Dominion Energy Virginia project which is closer to the state’s largest city. Private energy developer Avangrid Renewables LLC still needs a key easement…
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One Case, Five Virginia Energy Reg Failures
by Steve Haner How badly broken is Virginia’s energy regulatory system? One recent State Corporation Commission decision on Dominion Energy Virginia’s proposed next wave of solar projects illustrates several of the problems. The projects are unimportant, routine. What matters are the policy failures revealed. Only the rich can look at the future and yawn.
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Note to Hybrid and EV Owners and Those in Collisions with Them – Don’t Try to Extinguish a Battery Fire
by James C. Sherlock CNBC reported today as breaking news a concern about hybrid and electric vehicle fires that professional firefighters have known about for some time. Vehicles with lithium-ion batteries can be especially dangerous when they catch fire. CNBC offers a video showing smoke billowing from three electric pickups parked tightly together. Moments later,…
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Strategic Insanity Off the Coast of Virginia
by James C. Sherlock As I warned in three columns in late December, the Pentagon has now objected to Department of the Interior plans to develop offshore wind farms along the central U.S. coast. It has warned that almost all of the areas planned for development of the huge turbines conflict with current military operations.…