Tag: Dominion
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Coal Ash Lessons from Hurricane Florence
Last month pounding rains from Hurricane Florence eroded a Duke Energy landfill, releasing some 2,000 cubic yards of soil and coal ash. Although Duke declared that the majority of displaced ash was collected in a ditch and haul road surrounding the landfill, North Carolina news media reported the “possible release” of material into the L.V.…
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This Certainly Demonstrates Something (Don’t Ask)
Under normal circumstances, building two wind turbines 27 miles off the coast of Virginia at a cost of $300 million would be neither reasonable nor prudent. They may produce the most expensive 12 megawatts of electricity in Virginia history. The only rational reason to go forward is to test technology which is becoming more common…
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A Thumb On The Scale for ACP?
A witness to whom Dominion Energy Virginia had vehemently objected, Gregory Lander of a company called Skipping Stone, had his time on the stand anyway at the State Corporation Commission Tuesday. His testimony might still be stricken, but the two commissioners and everybody else in the room heard it and then a lengthy cross-examination underlined…
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Dominion Objects to Testimony on Pipeline Cost
One of the first decisions the State Corporation Commission may need to make in Monday’s hearing on the Dominion Energy Integrated Resource Plan (IRP) is whether to allow and consider testimony about the cost of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline. Dominion filed a September 7 motion asking that testimony from a witness brought by Appalachian Voices…
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Dominion Proposal A Total Refresh, SCC Staff Says
The integrated resource plan (IRP) for Dominion Energy Virginia, pending at the State Corporation Commission, involves building or rebuilding enough generation to replace most of its existing capacity. That is one conclusion reached by the SCC staff’s own analysis of Dominion’s filed plans. A bottom line $5.6 billion estimate of the 15-year customer cost of this…
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Dominion Excess Profits Continued to Roll in 2017
During 2017 Dominion Energy Virginia earned $365 million in profits above the target return on equity the State Corporation Commission would likely have established, but of course the General Assembly regulates the utility now – not the SCC. For the year Dominion Energy’s profit margin on its Virginia operations was just under 14%, well above…
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Irony: Clean Money Group Donates More than Power Company
The Virginia Public Access Project has updated its list of largest campaign donors in Virginia, and the results making good reading. My money is cleaner than yours. Perhaps the most fascinating tidbit is that Charlottesville-based Michael Bills, founder of Clean Virginia and scourge of Dominion Energy Virginia’s influence on state politics, has injected more money…
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What a Tangled Analysis We Weave
Dominion Energy Virginia does not want state regulators to require a formal cost-benefit analysis of its plan to spend $3 billion on grid modernization over the next decade, reports the Richmond Times-Dispatch. “I do not believe it would be appropriate to impose such a requirement for its approval,” said Edward H. Baine, senior vice president…
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AP’s Latest Hit Piece: Journalism or Polemic?
Here we go again. The Associated Press’ Alan Suderman has popped out another context-free article making an issue of Dominion Energy’s tenfold increase in lobbying expenses over the past year to more than $1 million. That spending, writes Suderman, “came during a period when the company successfully pushed through legislation that could lead to substantial increases…
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State Solicits Input from Solar, Wind Stakeholders
A nonprofit company specializing in addressing complex public policy issues has begun holding a series of meetings to solicit input from solar and wind energy stakeholders that will be used to formulate the Northam administration’s update to the Virginia Energy Plan. Discussion topics will address community solar, corporate procurement of clean energy, state/local barriers to…
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Eat My (Coal) Dust!
In a possible early-warning sign of what may be in store for Virginia electricity consumers, North Carolina regulators have decided that Duke Energy could charge their Tarheel rate payers the first $778 million chunk of an estimated $5 billion in coal-ash cleanup costs. The sum does not include $100 million in two mismanagement penalties for…
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Virginia’s Political Class Isn’t Doing Much to Reduce CO2 Emissions — And It’s Working Out Just Fine
As faithful readers know well, I remain unpersuaded that the world is facing global-warming Armageddon or that we need to force a restructuring of the global energy economy to avert it. But as long as there’s even a remote chance that the emission of greenhouse gases (primarily CO2) might be driving cataclysmic climate change, I…
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Visual Impacts and Transmission Lines
Last week the U.S District Court for the District of Columbia rejected a last-ditch appeal by the National Parks Conservation Association and allied groups to block construction of the controversial high-voltage transmission line across the James River near Jamestown. Dominion Energy Virginia had embarked upon preliminary construction in February after winning a U.S. Army Corps…
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Virginia’s Date with RGGI
There’s a good chance that Virginia will participate in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) to cut utility CO2 emissions. The impact of the cap-and-trade system would be mostly symbolic. Barring litigation, Virginia could start participating later this year in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI, pronounced Reggie), a cap-and-trade program designed to reduce CO2…
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The Logperch Veto
Virginia has its very own snail darter — the Roanoke logperch, a threatened species of fish, the existence of which could delay or even obstruct a multibillion-dollar infrastructure project. The snail darter became a cause celebre for endangered species in 1973 when concerns arose that the habitat of the endangered fish would be obliterated by…