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Good News on Virginia’s Offshore Wind Power

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Peter Galuszka
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Offshore_WindBy Peter Galuszka

News that Dominion Virginia Power has won an auction to lease about 113,000 acres about 27 miles off Virginia Beach for an offshore wind turbine farm is welcome, but don’t expect anything to happen right away.

Dominion won the rights to develop the shallow waters from the Interior Department for $1.6 million. A wind farm at the location should be able to provide power to about 700,000 homes, a size comparable to a good bit of Northern Virginia.

But environmentalists have been skeptical about Dominion’s intentions given its reliance upon coal-fired plants and nuclear power stations. They have worried that Dominion might sit on the leases while it pursues other sources of nonrenewable energy that are far cheaper, notably natural gas. Dominion just won approval for a new, 1,358-megawatt gas plant in Brunswick County.

Another issue is Virginia’s laissez-faire attitude on forcing the development of renewable energy.

To encourage the development of clean energy, many states set renewable portfolio standards (RPS) dictating the percentage of a state’s energy sourcing that must come from wind, solar or other renewable source by a certain date.

Massachusetts has set a 15 percent standard to be met within a decade or so. New Jersey’s is 22.5 percent. Maryland’s is 20 percent by 2020. Virginia’s is 15 percent by 2025.

There’s one big difference, however. Virginia’s RPS is just a voluntary goal and has no legislative teeth. That could cause problems because wind power remains more expensive than coal or natural gas. There are differing opinions about whether wind is cheaper than nuclear power. Over the long term, wind may be the winner.

Dominion is under pressure from the State Corporation Commission to go with the cheapest form of energy available. If there were an enforceable renewable standard, it would be easier for the regulators to approve rate hikes for consumers to pay for wind power.

Besides such problems, there are reasons why wind is the way to go in the Old Dominion. The turbines would be in relatively shallow water of about 100 feet. Hampton Roads has plenty of fabricating plants to assemble turbines and platforms, plus lots of experienced labor.

There’s one other advantage. Since several major highways crossing area waters use tunnels, there are no bridges to restrict the movement of equipment to the lease area. That’s not the case in New England, where a small farm is planned off Cape Cod.

All in all, the Virginia wind power announcement is a step forward.

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8 responses to “Good News on Virginia’s Offshore Wind Power”

  1. Breckinridge Avatar
    Breckinridge

    I’m glad there will be an effort to explore and test this. I’m all for a demonstration project. I predict it will prove prohibitively expensive when compared to other choices. Virginia will not have in the foreseeable future a mandatory RPS and that is good news for our economic health. Wind needs to make the grade without a thumb on the scale.

  2. larryg Avatar
    larryg

    wind is actually cheaper than coal or nukes if you account for what it will cost to clean up mercury pollution from coal and the insurance and offsite storage costs of nukes.

    but wind won’t work without a smart grid that can dynamically load balance – right now it’s more manual than automatic although the good news is that nat gas turbines, unlike coal or nukes can ramp up or done quickly and nicely complement wind and solar.

    we think wind/solar are not practical but if you look at most of the worlds islands – they don’t have native fossil fuels and have to import them for electricity and it costs on the order of 40-50 cents per KWH – about 4 – 5 times what we pay.

    what that means is that more and more research and innovation are going to be invested in solar and wind because they do offer shorter term promise for places that don’t have native fossil fuels.

    having said that – nat gas has undermined wind/solar as a cheaper alternative to coal or nukes.

    Eventually we do run out of “reasonably-priced” fossil fuels including Nat Gas but I think it might be decades away.

  3. Peter Galuszka Avatar
    Peter Galuszka

    Breck these are not demonstration projevts. Dominion has a one small one nearby. You do not recognize the impact of coal plants on weather. Maybe you should go to mongolia which relies on coal like i did two years ago. I was coughing upblack stuff

  4. larryg Avatar
    larryg

    most folks do not realize just how much mercury is put into the atmosphere by coal plants:

    http://www.mercuryinschools.uwex.edu/lib/images/curriculum/hg_deposition.gif

    and

    www [dot] edf [dot] org/health/reports/mercury-alert-cleaning-up-coal-plants

  5. larryg Avatar
    larryg

    if a rule were passed that said that no electricity source could put out more pollution than wind/solar – the cost to restrict that pollution in coal would make it as costly as solar and wind.

    I’m not advocating that but I’m pointing out that on an apple to apple basis – coal is being subsidized by allowing the significant pollution it does emit.

    we are getting cheap electricity in exchange for raining down mercury on the landscape.

  6. Breckinridge Avatar
    Breckinridge

    Actually, Larry, nuclear plants do ramp up fairly easily (note in the movies when the sub commander says “go to 110 percent!”) and they are a very logical complement to a wind farm. And of course there is zero air pollution. But the enviros don’t really care about air pollution, they care about making electricity expensive and rare and moving us all back to their utopian vision. I very much support a move away from coal (I laugh at the phrase “clean” coal, although the new plants are cleaner) but my preferred generation mix includes new reactors at North Anna and Surry. They could be the SMR’s under development in Lynchburg. That’s a very exciting technology.

  7. Peter Galuszka Avatar
    Peter Galuszka

    Breckinridge,
    Few problems with nuclear. Fukushima is still polluting and DOminion got a bad surprise at North Anna after that earthquake here a couple of years ago.
    Nukes also do not reflect the massive billions of bucks the feds have put into the industry since the 1950s.
    I also find it amusing when conservatives whine about wind turbines and government support when nukes have had gobs of it for years.

  8. larryg Avatar
    larryg

    Breckinridge – the plants are subs are much smaller and run hot all the time on purpose.

    you might find this interesting: the technical term is called load-following:

    “Nuclear power plants[edit source
    Nuclear (and coal) power plants may take many hours, if not days, to achieve a steady state power output. In general it is not economical for large thermal installations such as nuclear power plants to practice load following.”

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Load_following_power_plant

    NatGas is the complement and a grid that can better dynamically load from lots of sources. Right now, many companies do not want the wind/solar if they don’t have the ability to load balance – they just reject it from coming onto the grid because they cannot ramp down the other sources quickly.

    you’re using a broad brush on ALL of the enviros I think.

    no one that I know wants to make electricity more expensive just to be making it more expensive; they consider it to be polluting – causing harm to wildlife, people and the environment that we live in.

    You can have “clean coal” – but the smoke stack becomes a de-facto filter/recycle system and would likely double the price of electricity.

    no one that I know wants that – but they do think if we have the opportunity to use cleaner fuels – we should.

    I’m in favor of Nukes that cannot melt down. pebble bed and similar technologies that also can come in smaller packages that would make them less damaging if they go bad and less of a target for terrorists.

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