Category: Energy
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McKinsey & Company Has You Covered
by James C. Sherlock Ever feel not only disconnected from, but ignored by central planners? Do you run a shoe store in Sterling or work for a hospital in Richmond? Use natural gas in your home or work? Teach in a public school in Wise County? Drive a gas-or diesel-powered vehicle? In other words, do…
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Dominion Wants To Rewrite Its Own Rules Again
by Steve Haner First published today by the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy. The headlines in the coming General Assembly may be captured by fights over abortion and taxes, but the deepest reach into your pockets will involve your energy bills. The state’s dominant electric utility appears to once again be seeking to amend…
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You’ll Have to Pry My Steering Wheel from My Cold, Dead Fingers
The latest from the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy…. I don’t have any philosophical objections to electric vehicles. If they offer better performance for the price than combustion-powered cars, I wouldn’t hesitate to buy one. I do have public-policy reservations about government subsidies for EVs and EV infrastructure, and I do have concerns about…
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The Big Christmas Chill Was a Wakeup Call
by Bill O’Keefe As temperatures dropped dramatically over the Christmas weekend, Dominion Energy’s advice to its customers — those who still had power — was to turn down their thermostats. Virginia was not alone. PJM, the regional grid management organization covering 13 states and the District of Columbia, made the same request because its gas…
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Offshore Wind Turbines in International Waters Raise Big Defense Issues
By James C. Sherlock The Department of the Interior (DOI) is unlikely to be expert in the diplomatic issues and defense vulnerabilities inherent in building wind turbine farms in international waters. The DOI is, however, greatly concerned with “viewscape” – whether the turbine blades can be seen from shore. By the wealthy who live there…
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After Arctic Blast, Do We Still Want to Californicate Our Grid?
by Scott Dreyer An old saying goes, “You don’t miss the water till the well runs dry.” In modern days that might be, “You don’t miss the electricity till you lose the lights. And heat. And hot water. And wifi. And TV. And microwave. And phone charger. And electric blanket, and The Roanoke Star….” Around…
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Dominion’s Planned Offshore Wind Farm Need Not – and Must Not – Be Built Where Planned
by James C. Sherlock I am referring in the title, of course, to Dominion Power’s Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind (CVOW) project to be located in the hatched area below. It is planned for one of the U.S. Department of the Interior’s (DI) Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) offshore wind farm lease areas. Lease areas…
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Offshore Wind Turbines and Submarine Warfare
by James C. Sherlock Upon investigation of open source literature, I find that offshore wind turbines are less noisy than I imagined. But they present obstacles nonetheless, both physically and acoustically. United States submarine and anti-submarine efforts, operationally, in Navy labs, and in industry are led by some of our best and brightest. That is…
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Dominion’s Wind Gamble Could Cost Customers
by William O’Keefe A study by the Kleiman Center for Energy Policy at the University of Pennsylvania concluded that reaching long-term offshore wind power targets presents serious challenges with “the most pressing being the need to build out the electric grid to reliably and economically deliver vast quantities of offshore wind power.” And that also…
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SCC Drops Wind Energy Performance Standard
by Steve Haner The Virginia State Corporation Commission (SCC) has abandoned its push for an offshore wind performance standard fiercely opposed by Dominion Energy Virginia. It agreed instead to some capital cost limitations for its project that the utility has endorsed . In a decision released today, the two commissioners accepted in full a stipulation put…
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Heads I Win, Tails You Lose
by James A. Bacon I’m so confused. We’ve been hearing for years that air pollution from fossil fuel plants disproportionately impacts minorities. Take, for example, a 2018 Environmental Protection Agency study which found that African-Americans faced a 54% higher health burden from particulate air emissions like soot compared to the overall population. Systemic racism was…
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Virginia Agrees To Compensate Fishing Industry For Damage From Offshore Wind
by Steve Haner Nine states, including Virginia, have agreed to establish a major compensation fund to pay their private commercial and recreational fishing companies for damages caused by offshore wind turbines. Three guesses where the money comes from. The announcement, made December 12, hints at it coming from project developers, but in Virginia of course…
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RGGI Tax, On Path to Repeal, Reaches $524 Million
by Steve Haner First published this morning by the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy. The tax on each ton of carbon dioxide emitted by Virginia electricity plants dropped to below $13 a ton in the most recent sale of CO2 allowances conducted by the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). That meant Virginia collected only…
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Why Does Dominion Fear a Wind Output Promise?
By Steve Haner While we await a decision by the State Corporation Commission on competing approaches for protecting consumers from unexpected offshore wind costs, some additional relevant information is worthy of notice. Two items call into question Dominion Energy Virginia’s refusal to assume financial risk for poor turbine performance.
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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…