Category: Regulations, Gov’t Oversight
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Loudoun Public Schools – Suitable for Economically Secure Asian and White Kids Only
by James C. Sherlock If your kids are Asian or white and economically advantaged, Loudoun County Public Schools are worth a try. Otherwise, forget it. At my age I am seldom surprised. The failures of Loudoun County Public Schools (LCPS) to educate so many of their children in the wealthiest county in America have easily…
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What Dominion is Hiding in its Wind Application
by Steve Haner When an applicant at the State Corporation Commission claims certain information is proprietary, or extraordinarily sensitive, a reader not privy to the full document can at least get an idea what is missing. What is missing from the application Dominion Energy Virginia recently filed at the SCC, a document so dense and…
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Turbine Costs Appear on Dominion Bills in 2022?
by Steve Haner Customers of Dominion Energy Virginia will begin to pay for its planned 176 wind turbines off the coast of Virginia Beach next September, years before the first electricity is produced, if the company’s request for initial project funding is approved by the State Corporation Commission. As with all such projects now, the…
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The World Doesn’t Work that Way
by Bill O’Keefe The political elites who promoted the passage of the Virginia Clean Economy Act would have us believe that planning an energy transition is no more difficult than planning a long vacation. You know where you want to go, how long you will be gone, and how you plan to travel. The Clean…
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General Herring: Air All Data in Wind Application
An open letter to Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring: Dear General Herring: As was reported by the Richmond Times-Dispatch, Dominion Energy Virginia filed on Friday its application for approval to build offshore wind turbines with a nameplate capacity of 2,600 megawatts. The very first motion made to the State Corporation Commission was a request to…
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Personnel is Policy On Future Energy Reform
by Steve Haner Does Tuesday’s election result mean Virginia is going to move back towards a rational energy policy? Watch two key personnel decisions, both entirely matters for the next legislature to decide. State Corporation Commissioner Angela Navarro was elected by the 2021 General Assembly to fill the unexpired term of Mark Christie, who moved…
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Should Choice of Supplier Extend to Natural Gas?
by Steve Haner Should there be retail choice for natural gas? The developers of a proposed natural gas-fired merchant electricity plant are testing the waters with a proposal to bypass their local monopoly supplier by building their own one-customer pipeline to another source. In the electricity arena, this is an old issue as large industrial…
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The Loudoun Way — School Rapes by a Member of a Progressive Protected Class
by James C. Sherlock Any time you think there is only one system of justice in America, consider these two stories I offer below, one a progressive dream and the other true. The true story will show some progressives care more about their dogma than kids. And any time you think only big city progressives…
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Finally, Virginia’s Political Class Starts Thinking about Grid Reliability
by James A. Bacon At last — a serious discussion has occurred about the reliability of Virginia’s electric grid as the state moves toward zero-carbon electricity generation by 2050 (and 2045 in the Dominion Energy service territory). Reliability was a prime topic of conversation at the third Virginia Clean Energy Summit Tuesday. A panel discussion…
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Virginia Preschool Initiative (VPI+) Pilot – Hidden Data, Disappearing Value — Thanks for Nothing
by James C. Sherlock This is a follow-up to my Monday report on VPI+, a federally funded four-year pilot program to assess the value of the Virginia Preschool Initiative. Today we will discuss what was not reported to the public. We will also assess the dreadful results of the pilot participants after those kids graduated…
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Climate Rationality Preached in a UVA Pulpit
by Steve Haner Efforts to rapidly expand our reliance on wind and solar generation for electricity, while at the same time closing baseload natural gas generation with similar haste, makes no sense economically. “The only explanation for that policy is you want to shut down the economy.” Another voice of reason has emerged to challenge…
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Dominion and Despicable Voter Suppression
by Steve Haner Dominion Energy Virginia’s knowing participation in an effort to suppress the November 2 vote, aimed mainly at Western Virginia Republicans, is a truly despicable act. It should enrage all Virginians, without regard to party. This is a state-created and regulated monopoly and the $200,000 it spent on this underhanded activity was provided…
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Big Lessons from Government Data on Virginia’s 286 Nursing Facilities
by James C. Sherlock Nursing facilities in Virginia offer an incredible mixed bag. There are heroes and villains. Much to see here. This column will offer expansive views of government data on each of the 286 nursing facilities in this state. I found out a lot things that really matter to the quality of…
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Northam Plastics Order Will Backfire
by Brett Vassey Governor Northam recently issued Executive Order 77 (EO 77) mandating all state agencies (including colleges and universities) to ban purchasing or using certain plastics products (primarily foodservice and trash bags) by October 2021, ban plastic bottled water, phase out all single-use plastic items by 2025, source and use non-plastic alternatives, and compost…
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Nursing Home Ads Pose As Official State Advice
by James C. Sherlock The Virginia state government has a Department for Aging and Rehabilitative Services. Who wouldn’t want one of those? But in the case of recommending nursing homes, it would be better if it would either stop or fix its broken system. Which it pays a nonprofit, VirginiaNavigator, to run. It is…