Dominion Power seeks ideas for green projects

Dominion  Virginia Power, the state’s largest electric utility, is looking to get greener.

Actually, Dominion must get greener, mostly because of government rules in Virginia and North Carolina that at least 12 percent of the company’s energy come from renewable sources by 2022.

Dominion currently draws about 2 percent of its power from green energy supplies, including a large biomass facility in Pittsylvania County and a hydroelectric pumping station in the mountains of Bath County.

To expand its environmental portfolio, the Richmond-based conglomerate is seeking project proposals from entrepreneurs and businesses to provide more renewable energy in the near future.

The company is accepting proposals through Feb. 1 and expects “to see a lot of interest,” said Jim Martin, a Dominion senior vice president for business development and generation construction.

Martin would not say how much money Dominion is willing to spend on the initiative, but said that new technologies will have to be developed.  

 Dominion already is investing in a planned wind farm in Grant County, W.Va, Martin said. As designed, 132 turbines would churn out enough energy for more than 60,000 homes, the company estimates.

But Dominion also is pursuing a new coal-fired power plant in Wise County in southwest Virginia, a project being fought by environmentalists, who say the utility should be moving away from fossil fuels and toward cleaner-burning alternatives. Emissions from coal-fired plants are linked to global warming, mercury contamination and smog.

“The only time we’ll ever see serious renewable energy in Virginia is when Dominion gets serious about it,” said Mike Town, state director of the Sierra Club.

The requests for green projects in Virginia and North Carolina, Town said, “are nice, but when they’re also investing more than a billion dollars in Wise County and more dirty coal, it becomes token stuff.”

Martin said such criticism is unrealistic.

“In order to meet one of the fastest-growing demands in the country, we need a very balanced portfolio,” he said. That means investing in coal as well as renewables, energy conservation and efficiencies, and nuclear power.

Dominion announced last month that it intends to seek a federal license to build a third reactor at its North Anna nuclear power plant, northwest of Richmond.

While free of air emissions, nuclear power is not counted as renewable energy. As defined by the government, renewable sources include solar, wind, falling water, wave motion, tidal action, geothermal, landfill gases and biomass burning of wood chips and garbage. Gov. Timothy M. Kaine applauded Dominion’s pursuit of more renewables.

“This kind of leadership from our private-sector partners is crucial,” Kaine said in a statement.

Dominion has been offering green power to its Virginia customers since 2002 through the Energy Choice program, said David F. Koogler, director of state regulation and pricing.

Today, Koogler said, 1,296 residents and 18 businesses – mostly in Northern Virginia, but also in Hampton Roads, Richmond and Charlottesville – are signed up to receive renewable energy from a specialty company licensed to do business in Virginia, Pepco Energy Services.

Pepco produces the green power through wind and biomass sources, and Dominion distributes the energy through its network. The option costs subscribers about double the existing base rate, Koogler said.

In North Carolina, Dominion also participates in the N.C. Green Power program, which allows customers to buy 100-kilowatt blocks of renewable energy. About 12,000 customers do so today, Koogler said.

North Carolina has taken a harder line on renewables than its  neighbor, passing a mandatory standard that utilities must provide 12.5 percent of their electricity from green sources by 2021.

Virginia instead adopted a voluntary goal that 12 percent of electric sales should stem from renewable sources by 2022. Congress last week  mulled the same issue.

A national energy bill that passed the House included a mandatory 15 percent renewable requirement by 2020. But the Senate blocked the bill Thursday , then approved a different measure later that day – minus the 15 percent mandate.

Dominion opposed the national standard, arguing that a state-by-state approach to renewable energy is better.

“Each state is so different,” said Chet Wade, a Dominion spokesman. “You could easily do wind in Texas or Kansas, but not in, say, Connecticut. Different states require different solutions.”

Scott Harper, (757) 446-2340, scott.harper@pilotonline.com