SCC approves Dominion Virginia Power's 18% rate increase

Have you actually ever tried to use the computers at the public library? The last two times I was at the library (Virginia Beach Central), the first time it was down, the second, it took a clean 10 minutes just to pull up the Virginia Beach Public Library website. Something tells me using those computers for anything urgent or necessary would be an exercise in dissapointment, and futility.

How about alternate resources such as methane power? Cities nationwide have invested in power plants that use the energy from methane gas to power up facilities, homes, etc. Hampton Roads has such an abundant and endless supply of garbage. Garbage, if you're not aware, emits methane into our atmosphere having adverse affects to the environment. Methane is highly explosive and the major component of natural gas. Why not tap into this somewhat 'free' resource to either supplement or replace the current way we fuel our power plants.

France gets approximately 80 percent of their electricity from nuclear power plants. The United States gets 18 percent from nuclear. We should have been building nuclear plants for the past 30 years regardless of the tree huggers.

4,500 watts of photo voltaic power is barely enough to provide minimum electrical service to a single home, and it will not even begin to run an air conditioner. A typical electric hot water heater uses 4,500 watts when the elements are activated. From a cost standpoint, I don't believe it's practical to retrofit to photo voltaic cells unless you plan to live in the house for many, many years. However, if the price of electricity doubles, like gas has, photo voltaic may become an option worth considering.

Does anyone know if it is possible or feasible for neighbors to "share" solar panels. The cost split among 3 or 4 people would not be as bad. This would be easy to do on condos, townhouses, and apartment buildings.

I suspect that all of you who are whining about the raise, would also be the first to whine when we have rolling brown-outs in the years to come because the electrical infrastructure could not be maintianed, let alone increased. Stop whining and fight for expansion of renewable energy. Get the politicians to tie future expansion, tax breaks or rate increases to increases in renewable energy sources, including nuclear. If France can use nuclear for 100% of their energy, without problem, why can't we? If you really face thousands of dollars in increased electric costs, how about being a community leader, instead of a community whiner and set the example by adding or converting to alternative energy where possible, such as solar. Another trend to reduce electric costs are gardens on top of flat roofed buildings. The dirt, grass, and gardening on the top of a roof (usually high rises and indu

Everybody on a certain day turn on everything electric at a certain time, irons, heating blankets, blenders, etc… wait a few and then shut it down, see how many things get screwed up. I have been told by a power company rep., that they will be fined a million a day when power is out. That is why they are so busy cutting trees and replacing lines and transformers. We get to pay for it in advance. I kept smelling a gas leak, finally they came out dug in my yard and fixed a nice size hole, some of the biggest worms I have ever seen were in that dirt. Then they replaced a union at their side of my meter that had a hole even bigger. They said everything else was on my side. I quickly got a soapy solution and sprayed every joint and connection inside the house and outside. When it comes to Having Cox cable, get Direct tv not Dish. Dish has problems, I had them for a year and then got Direct, big difference, I called dish nin

I have a gas powered back up generator rated at 4,500 watts continuous. It will run a few lights, a TV, a few fans, and the refrigerator, enough to get by on until power is restored.

According to my cursory research, it would take 369 square feet (think 20 feet by 20 feet, roughly) of photo voltaic cells to produce approximately 4,500 watts of power on a full sun day, and the cells alone would cost about $24,000 dollars. That doesn't include any material needed for installation or the cost of installation.

A geothermal, closed loop heat pump can be installed for a lot less, and with a SEER equivalent of 23, it cuts the heating and air conditioning costs in half. It does help to have R-40 in the attic and high efficiency windows, but I figure that I save over $1400 annually on my heating/air conditioning costs compared to my neighbors in similar sized homes who have air to air heat pumps.

coolguy81 wrote:

Thats a whole lot to assume. Not everyone crying about the squeeze of EVERYTHING is in possession of all, or even any, of those luxuries.

Granted, however if they are here, posting, they are probably spending money on things (luxuries) they don't, absolutely, need.

...have you ever tried to apply for a job recently? It is luck if you find one that doesnt require you to email your resume, or fill out something on their website.

Give me a break, if you have to have the internet for a job search/application, you can go to any public library; you can do anything there you want to do at home.

Well, almost anything...

I understand why you folks are mad, but who did you think was going to pay for the raising fuel prices? Everyone is passing it on to the next consumer down the line. If you were a farmer, wouldn't you have to raise your prices to pay for your costs? Do thing that even a monopoly can crap their own coal?

Stop whining and come up with solutions. We used to be a country of inventors!

Are you saying that our representatives in the General Assembly are the best that money can buy??

I wondered about that when I saw that the State Senator who wrote the deregulation legislation for Dominion and the re-regulation legislation was a hunting buddy of the CEO of Dominion, and when I saw all the money that Dominion had spread around to members of the GA. Of course, we all know that our representatives in Richmond aren't beholden to campaign contributions which enable them to stay in power. Right.

sjy - it's more like 40 years for a return on investment if you purchase the parts from a normal dealer. You might be able to cut that down heavily if you can get gray market panels. I've looked at it a bit, and if I had a house I would probably go for it. The good news is you can scale the systems. The bad news is I wasn't getting much of a break going straight to China getting quotes on 2x4 panels.

This is the Republican form of raising tax without actually calling it a tax increase. They just call it fees which will cost way more than the dems vers of tax increase.

We have monopolies - like Dominion Power. Because they are a monopoly, they can charge whatever they want and we have to go along with it. You want to see what deregulation has done to the power industry? Ask anyone from Maryland or any other state that has allowed deregulation: their power rates have skyrocketed! Why do you think Dominion Power is spending the thousands and thousands of dollars on PR to make themselves look good and push for deregulation? For the good of the people? Until there is competition set up and ready to provide power for those that want an alternative, government regulation is the only way to protect companies and the citizens from run away price hikes. I do think our representatives in Richmond have become a rubber stamp to Dominion Power. But then, if someone had given me all kinds of money for reelection, I would be beholden to them too.

According to our Commander-in-Chief, the 3.7% we got was too generous. He would have preferred we get 3.2%. 18% is a pipe dream. As a PO1 in the USN, I will obey the orders of the President and all those appointed over me. But as a citizen, I personally think that George W. Bush is an idiot and, no matter who is elected in November, 21 Jan 2009 will be the end of an error and hopefully the beginning of some kind of recovery.

thinks that oil should be regulated and taxed. Good idea!! We'll just add that to the 35 percent corporate tax that they currently pay, and then oil can pass the increase on to the consumers at the pump. Corporations don't pay taxes, individuals pay taxes. And while we're at it, the government can regulate and tax the electric industry, the pharmaceutical industry, the auto industry, and just about every other industry in the U..S., because they all have a greater profit margin than oil, and before you know it we'll be just like the Soviet Union before glasnost. No thanks. I'll stick with capitalism. Despite it's faults, it's better than communism.

With all these companies raising rates and fees because their costs are going up maybe I can get in on that game. Do you think the Navy will give me an 18% raise because my operating costs have gone up?

Am I the only one who has noticed that the rate increase is going into effect now that they got our legislators to opt out of the deregulation idea. Thge one where you could purchase electricity from other power companies. And by the way if the power company was sincere about their costs going up they wouldn't hand out these huge bonuses to their employees. That's a practice that needs to end and end now. They pay their employees pretty good salaries. And when I say bonuses I don't mean a 500 dollar Christmas bonus. I'm talking over 10k practically every year. enuf is enuf.

People really complaining about cable TV compared to electricity? Just unplug the thing and go outside or get a book.

I will be looking into solar panels that will provide up to 95% of the electricity to run everything in my house. Yeah, I saw it on T.V. and I don't believe everything I see or read. But even 50% of the electricity would help. I understand it can take 10 years to pay for itself, but look at the past 10 years! These rates aren't going to ever go down.

Instead of a New World Order it appears that we a New World Disorder!!!

When I had an office the average usage was around 5000 KwHr. Glad I don't have that anymore! I'm going to be checking my bills to check out my utilization. I bet this is just payback for all the greenheads going to compact florescent lights. Isn't China moving to install a large number of nuclear plants? I'd be down with the dominion price increase if they were investing more into nuclear versus coal. Throw a few more reactors at Surrey .

According to our leaders, excluding volatile food and energy prices, inflation is tame and in the lower 2% area.
LOL

My husband worked for one of the plants in Chesapeake(not Ford)that shut down after 27 years of employment. The plant shut down before he was ready to retire. Now, we have a fixed income, real estate taxes are unreasonable, even though our home is paid for - THANK GOD. Cable is ridiculous with what you get on basic cable as we don't want "junk" shows in the house, so Cox has you over a barrel if you want to keep moral shows on (even that is questionable on Basic). We are having to come up with money for city sewage in Chesapeake at the tune of $12,000! Now, the electric company gets an increase! Gas if impacting everyone. We try to limit out travels, but good grief! We go to garage sales to buy DVDs, VHS movies, as going to the actual movie is outrageous! What are we coming to? The end! The smartest thing we did was to get on the "budget plan" with Va. Power, otherwise, you'd get a whopper of a bill with this heat

Thats a whole lot to assume. Not everyone crying about the squeeze of EVERYTHING is in possession of all, or even any, of those luxuries.

Additionally, some things, such as the internet, have become such a part of life, its nearly impossible to function without access to one. For instance, have you ever tried to apply for a job recently? It is luck if you find one that doesnt require you to email your resume, or fill out something on their website. Most companies are shedding traditional advertising altogether (such as in newspapers or trade papers). Grandma and Grandpa didnt have to be concerned with that.

Incidentally, with someone mentioning Cox in this. Keep in mind that Cox is *NOT* a utlity company. Granted, it's a status of our sad society that we consider cable to be a necessity of life, but Cox and Dominion are on two different levels. You have an option in how you bring programming to your television. The utility companies always bend over the consumer because of their extended control on the market. The SCC is supposed to be protecting the consumer for that reason. Not that they do.

Incidentally, if they're trying to open coal plants in SW VA to generate power, then WTF did they construct nuclear power plants for that are supposed to be cleaner and generate more power for less natural resource??

But it wasn't unexpected. All the more reason to support research in alternative energy solutions, including nuclear power.

Vote for me and electricity is free. I am also proposing blue skies during the days and rain at night. A median tempature of 80 degrees will instated.

Don't ask how...just vote for me and send money.

Do you honestly think that with the price of oil it's going to stop here? Everything is going to go up. We're in a big mess. Get with the program.

The reason for the large rate jump is the government regulation preventing small changes. Hold it until it snaps is not the best policy for consumers but it is good for politicians trying to get elected.

Really, if they're going to approve every increase and markup proposed by Dominion, can't they just get patches for their suits so we don't have to think they're actually working for the best interests of the State? We've got Tim Kaine wanting to get MORE TAX MONEY TO SUPPLY NORTHERN VIRGINIA'S ROAD BUDGET, we've got Dominion increasing their revenues through our gas and electric bills, we've got the gas companies bleeding us dry at the pump. When is someone in this state's government going to realize you can't get blood from a stone and it's time to start looking at WHERE the money is going, instead of HOW MUCH MORE can we get.

Mark Warner's ads about how great the state was in his term shows just how far down the hill we've fallen. Maybe he needs to fix Virginia one more time before he runs off to fix the US through a senate seat.