Virginia made history five years ago when the groundbreaking Virginia Clean Economy Act (VCEA) became law. It embraced cleaner, more affordable and more reliable energy sources to power our homes and businesses. Implementing the VCEA is more critical than ever to insulate Virginians from rising bills due to developments in Washington that promise skyrocketing energy costs. As energy demand rapidly grows, the VCEA vision remains achievable and provides the kind of right-here, right-now affordable solutions Virginia needs.
Investing in homegrown clean energy is the most affordable, fastest path forward. Solar, wind and battery storage are consistently more affordable and faster to build than gasfired power plants, which also carry a lifetime guarantee of price instability and rate hikes. Gas prices are unpredictable, tied to global markets and the vagaries of geopolitics. Virginians deserve better than being locked into that rate hike rollercoaster.
People forget — and VCEA detractors purposely avoid reminding them — that we all pay on our electric bills for the cost of building any type of electricity generation, including a gas plant and the gas that powers it. Critics try to scare Virginians by claiming the VCEA will create “$5.5 billion in costs,” but they disingenuously fail to acknowledge that the costs of using other technologies will be much greater.
In fact, Dominion Energy has calculated that the VCEA is saving Virginia’s ratepayers more than $500 million every year on fuel, totaling $6.6 billion just through 2035, since the sun and wind are free.
Over the next 50 years the VCEA will save Virginians $118 billion in fuel costs, keeping energy affordable for Virginia’s families. Case in point: Dominion estimates that if its offshore wind facility had been operational during the deep freeze of Winter Storm Elliott, Virginians would have saved $40 million from just that single four-day weather event. Just a few months from now that wind project will start generating electricity — and savings — every day.
Those who claim that the VCEA is driving up electric bills are simply not being honest
with Virginians.
Some opponents of the VCEA insist that it is impossible to reach its goals. But several models were submitted during recent SCC proceedings that showed multiple paths to meeting the VCEA goals. Beyond affordability, solar combined with storage is the solution to help meet energy demand. Gas plants can take many years to permit, finance and construct, and that’s time we simply don’t have if we want to keep up with Virginia’s fast-growing energy needs.
Solar and storage projects can be built and brought online in a fraction of the time — getting clean, reliable power flowing to Virginians more quickly.
The stress being put on our grid by the increasing demand from data centers, which poses a new challenge requiring a fast response, is not a reason to give up on the VCEA. It is the reason to strengthen it, accelerate it and adapt it to make sure the lights stay on and our phones and computers keep humming. It’s time to recommit ourselves to the goals that guided us from the start.
Clean energy is reliable. With modern battery storage, we can store solar and wind power — even nuclear power — when it’s abundant and cheaper. We can then dispatch it when it’s needed most — not just during blue-sky days, but also during storms and heat waves or cold snaps when we see sharp increases in demand. That means reliability and resilience, and it means keeping energy affordable for Virginians. That’s what the VCEA is all about: meeting our energy needs, while lowering Virginians’ energy bills.
Can the VCEA be improved? Of course. When we originally passed it we knew that conditions and technology would change in ways we couldn’t anticipate. We’ve made several changes to it since it passed, dealing with biomass, adding geothermal and increasing shared solar.
Indeed, my colleagues and I just tried to improve it again during the last General Assembly session, including a bipartisan bill that would have significantly expanded its battery storage provisions, enhancing grid reliability and helping to lower energy costs for Virginia’s families. But the governor chose to veto it.
The VCEA makes even more sense now, given skyrocketing fuel costs and the urgent need to rapidly increase generation. We can continue adapting it to our expanding energy demands while keeping us on track — a track that is more affordable, clean, efficient and reliable than any of the alternatives. Even in the face of a hostile federal administration, Virginia has been a leader on affordable clean energy. We can and will do it again.
