Va. SCC Begins Consideration of Dominion’s Chesterfield Gas Plant
Finally, some movement on approving a new gas-fired power plant project in Chesterfield County, VA. Dominion Energy plans to build four small “peaker” electric generating plants in Chesterfield County near Richmond (see Dominion Plans to Build 1,000-MW Gas Peaker Plant Near Richmond, VA). The Chesterfield Energy Reliability Center (CERC) calls for building four 250-megawatt gas-fired power plants (1,000 MW total) that can jump into action during the coldest and hottest days of the year to help supply enough electricity for 250,000 homes—to keep the lights on because solar and wind are not up to the task. The State Corporation Commission (SCC) is currently deliberating on whether to approve the project. Read More “Va. SCC Begins Consideration of Dominion’s Chesterfield Gas Plant”
We must confess that we’re disappointed in Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin (Republican). After such a promising term as governor (term limited to a single, four-year term, ending this year), Youngkin joined a gang of Democrat governors, headed by the biggest bully of them all, Pennsylvania’s Josh Shapiro, in bashing PJM at a “bash PJM” event hosted by Shapiro in Philadelphia earlier this week. Youngkin and various Dem governors, including Maryland’s Wes Moore and New Jersey’s Phil Murphy, made threats against PJM via speeches delivered remotely (they couldn’t even be bothered to travel a few hours to Philly to be there in person). We say fine, take your marbles and go home. Leave PJM and see how that works out for you when your residents are sitting in the dark 50% of the time and you’ve ended your political careers overnight. 
We’ll begin this post with this statement: We’re not surprised. At the end of last December, Venture Global’s Plaquemines LNG export facility officially shipped its first cargo to Germany. Unfortunately for Venture Global’s contracted customers, they will have to wait to receive their legally contracted shipments. Venture Global said that it would (as it did with the Calcasieu Pass facility) pretend the Plaquemines LNG is not “commercially ready” while shipping all sorts of LNG cargoes around the world. The practice allows the company to cream the market and make more money for the first couple of years (see 
In the closing hours of the 2014 West Virginia legislative session, the legislature passed Senate Bill (SB) 373, the Aboveground Storage Tank Act (see 
PJM Interconnection is the electrical grid operator serving Pennsylvania, as well as parts of 12 other states and the District of Columbia. For months, the Democrat governors of PJM states have been criticizing PJM, blaming the grid operator for higher electricity prices, even though their own policies are driving electricity prices higher (see 
One of Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro’s big beefs with the PJM grid is that it doesn’t allow new sources of electric generation to be added quickly enough (see Gov. Shapiro Convenes Group to Blame PJM Grid for His Policies). Nationally, a potential solution is on the way. Last week, the U.S. House of Representatives passed Congressman Troy Balderson’s (OH-12) bill to expedite the construction of new power plants, thereby ensuring the long-term reliability of the American electric grid. H.R. 1047, the Guaranteeing Reliability through the Interconnection of Dispatchable (GRID) Power Act, makes a key improvement to the interconnection queue, where power generation projects wait in line before being reviewed by regulators. Time to cut the red tape for “dispatchable” power. 
Here’s a story that technically doesn’t have anything to do with shale energy. However, one of the characters in this story, THE Delaware Riverkeeper (that’s what Maya van Rossum calls herself), is a person who routinely attempts to block shale energy projects (and drilling). We think it’s fair to say Van Rossum, indeed, all card-carrying members of the far-left environmental movement hate Trump and anyone associated with Trump. So, when she praised (her word) a new final rule establishing federal water quality standards for 38 miles of the Delaware River between Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and Wilmington, Delaware, created by the Trump EPA, well…that’s a “man bites dog” kind of story! 
The highly functional and responsible Susquehanna River Basin Commission (SRBC), unlike its highly dysfunctional and irresponsible counterpart, the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC), continues to support the shale energy industry by approving water withdrawals and consumptive use requests for responsible and safe shale drilling. The SRBC published a notice in the September 20 Pennsylvania Bulletin that the Executive Director of the SRBC approved and/or renewed 40 general water use permits in August for individual shale gas well drilling pads in Bradford, Centre, Clearfield, Lycoming, Sullivan, Susquehanna, Tioga, and Wyoming counties in Pennsylvania. 
In April 2023, MDN told you about the Adams Fork Energy project, a multi-billion-dollar clean ammonia production facility planned for Mingo County, WV (see 
Under orders from the Biden White House in 2022, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) Chairman Richard “Dick” Glick tried to permanently enshrine global warming considerations as a requirement to approve all new pipeline projects (see 
In early April, MDN brought you the exciting news that pipeline giant Williams, via its subsidiary, Will-Power, is planning to build two Utica/Marcellus gas-fired power plants in the New Albany International Business Park in Licking County, Ohio (see 
In April, Knighthead Capital Management, Homer City Redevelopment (HCR), and Kiewit Power Constructors Co. announced a plan to convert the former Homer City Generating Station, previously the largest coal-fired power plant in Pennsylvania (Indiana County, 50 miles east of Pittsburgh) into a more than 3,200-acre natural gas-powered data center campus, designed to meet the growing demand for artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing (see 
Last week, MDN told you that there was a disagreement brewing between those who operate the PJM Interconnection power grid and Big Tech, including Amazon, Google, Microsoft, and others, regarding the issue of adding data centers to the PJM grid (see