I appreciate Helen Manich flagging Dominion's role in this and Senator Ebbin's work to improve the situation. There is a strong argument that, as a regulated public utility, Dominion ought to be required to bear the interconnection cost (which it could then roll into its rate base and eventually recover from all of its customers). The environmentally (and climate)-friendly trend in this policy area has been toward promoting distributed power generation and net-metering -- i.e., toward promoting installation by electricity consumers of small solar (and other renewable) projects and allowing them to sell their power to the connected utility when they generate more power than they need. The utility companies of course hate this -- but we, the electorate, ought to be able to say "too bad!" With a Democratic governor, we might be able to get something even better than Senator Ebbin's bill enacted.
As someone who has owned homes with rooftop solar in 3 different states, I can say with conviction that the mystical "powers that be"--particularly the power companies--try very hard to find obstacles to allowing independent solar to succeed. The result is a solar industry that is very fragmented and weak. It's a series of sad stories.
In December of 2023 - right before the holidays, the State Corporation Commission (handles the responsibilities of VA Public Utility Commission) passed regulations that allowed Dominion Power to charge "interconnection fees" with very few guard rails. The Solar projects for the Schools were already well underway. Dominion dragged it's feet for a long time to "access" the interconnection fee -- and dropped the bomb on Alexandria late the summer of 2024.
The "interconnection fee" is how Dominion is keeping Solar from financially or executable in VA. There were several bills attempting to address the issue in the legislative session which the Gov vetoed.
This wasn't a "corporate memory " error on by the school board -- It was Dominion - as an act the effects ALL residential and small business deployments of solar - and to stall the deployments.
In VA today, Dominion will not provide an estimate for the interconnection without a signed purchase agreement or a singed Power Purchase Agreement.
The interconnection fee charged to the Alexandria School Board is outragously high. The school board cannot turn on the system without the interconnection signoff from Dominion.
Thank you for your informative comment. I don't think this post accuses the Alexandria School Board of a corporate memory error. My point about the inoperative solar panels at the two schools was that, in the absence of an explanation such as yours or another account which ACPS has yet to provide, this situation looks like a contract administration failure. If the responsibility lies primarily with Dominion or the State Corporation Commission, those facts have not really come out in a clear way. In light of your comment, it may be an irony that Governor Youngkin signed a bill earlier this year directing the SCC to develop a cost-sharing program for solar installation grid connections.
You are good... however as both a former Teacher and School Board Member you bring to the discussion an appreciation for history and continuity few if any had. . You know every newly elected SB (and city council person) Member comes in thinking that as now that I've become an "elected official" it is the 7th day. "What history?
I believe that the original cost for the interconnection by Dominion was about 1/10th of the current Dominion inflated cost reported by other commenters for the 2 schools. So the amount was in the contract. What no one could have foreseen was Dominion requiring a whole new system allegedly for safety (but no other utility in the country is requiring this new safety feature - so are we to think they are all not safe but Dominion is?) and increasing the connection fee by 10 times the original amount suddenly. Yes the Ebbin bill can help and is far better than the Del Herring bill that would have provided a total of $1 million in grant money to support the connections - of course given the $1.3 million price tag as outlined by another commenter here - this wouldn’t have even supported 1 school if the Governor hadn’t vetoed her bill. It showed a startling ignorance of how much this is costing our schools and ratepayers, but that’s not surprising since Delegate Herring is known for her love of taking Dominion money and the killing of her democratic colleagues bills in subcommittee when she sides with the Rs. The best news is that even without the solar panels on MacArthur its power consumption is less than expected thanks to the city policy of net zero for public buildings and so the school is super energy efficient, comfortable and healthy for our kids.
This was undertaken by Sen Adam Ebbin to address the Alexandria School System.
Sen. Ebbin highlighted cases like Alexandria schools facing $1.3 million and $105,000 interconnection costs that threatened projects. SB 1058 seeks to ease that burden by spreading infrastructure upgrade costs across multiple projects served by the same substation
I appreciate Helen Manich flagging Dominion's role in this and Senator Ebbin's work to improve the situation. There is a strong argument that, as a regulated public utility, Dominion ought to be required to bear the interconnection cost (which it could then roll into its rate base and eventually recover from all of its customers). The environmentally (and climate)-friendly trend in this policy area has been toward promoting distributed power generation and net-metering -- i.e., toward promoting installation by electricity consumers of small solar (and other renewable) projects and allowing them to sell their power to the connected utility when they generate more power than they need. The utility companies of course hate this -- but we, the electorate, ought to be able to say "too bad!" With a Democratic governor, we might be able to get something even better than Senator Ebbin's bill enacted.
As someone who has owned homes with rooftop solar in 3 different states, I can say with conviction that the mystical "powers that be"--particularly the power companies--try very hard to find obstacles to allowing independent solar to succeed. The result is a solar industry that is very fragmented and weak. It's a series of sad stories.
In December of 2023 - right before the holidays, the State Corporation Commission (handles the responsibilities of VA Public Utility Commission) passed regulations that allowed Dominion Power to charge "interconnection fees" with very few guard rails. The Solar projects for the Schools were already well underway. Dominion dragged it's feet for a long time to "access" the interconnection fee -- and dropped the bomb on Alexandria late the summer of 2024.
The "interconnection fee" is how Dominion is keeping Solar from financially or executable in VA. There were several bills attempting to address the issue in the legislative session which the Gov vetoed.
This wasn't a "corporate memory " error on by the school board -- It was Dominion - as an act the effects ALL residential and small business deployments of solar - and to stall the deployments.
In VA today, Dominion will not provide an estimate for the interconnection without a signed purchase agreement or a singed Power Purchase Agreement.
The interconnection fee charged to the Alexandria School Board is outragously high. The school board cannot turn on the system without the interconnection signoff from Dominion.
Thank you for your informative comment. I don't think this post accuses the Alexandria School Board of a corporate memory error. My point about the inoperative solar panels at the two schools was that, in the absence of an explanation such as yours or another account which ACPS has yet to provide, this situation looks like a contract administration failure. If the responsibility lies primarily with Dominion or the State Corporation Commission, those facts have not really come out in a clear way. In light of your comment, it may be an irony that Governor Youngkin signed a bill earlier this year directing the SCC to develop a cost-sharing program for solar installation grid connections.
You are good... however as both a former Teacher and School Board Member you bring to the discussion an appreciation for history and continuity few if any had. . You know every newly elected SB (and city council person) Member comes in thinking that as now that I've become an "elected official" it is the 7th day. "What history?
I do love your writing.
I believe that the original cost for the interconnection by Dominion was about 1/10th of the current Dominion inflated cost reported by other commenters for the 2 schools. So the amount was in the contract. What no one could have foreseen was Dominion requiring a whole new system allegedly for safety (but no other utility in the country is requiring this new safety feature - so are we to think they are all not safe but Dominion is?) and increasing the connection fee by 10 times the original amount suddenly. Yes the Ebbin bill can help and is far better than the Del Herring bill that would have provided a total of $1 million in grant money to support the connections - of course given the $1.3 million price tag as outlined by another commenter here - this wouldn’t have even supported 1 school if the Governor hadn’t vetoed her bill. It showed a startling ignorance of how much this is costing our schools and ratepayers, but that’s not surprising since Delegate Herring is known for her love of taking Dominion money and the killing of her democratic colleagues bills in subcommittee when she sides with the Rs. The best news is that even without the solar panels on MacArthur its power consumption is less than expected thanks to the city policy of net zero for public buildings and so the school is super energy efficient, comfortable and healthy for our kids.
Here are story summaries and the links that reported on the issue as it evolved.
This is a link in Chat GPT which as links to a number of stories and a summary
https://chatgpt.com/share/6848dde2-f0b0-8007-90de-7ef973fd58cc
This was undertaken by Sen Adam Ebbin to address the Alexandria School System.
Sen. Ebbin highlighted cases like Alexandria schools facing $1.3 million and $105,000 interconnection costs that threatened projects. SB 1058 seeks to ease that burden by spreading infrastructure upgrade costs across multiple projects served by the same substation
ncelenviro.org
+3
connectionnewspapers.com
+3
aboutalexandria.substack.com
+3
.