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Tag: abandoned mines

SWVA projects recommended for $10M in federal grants

Four Southwest Virginia economic development projects have been recommended to receive a cumulative $10 million in federal Abandoned Mine Land Economic Revitalization (AMLER) grants, Gov. Glenn Youngkin and U.S. Rep. Morgan Griffith, R-Salem, announced Monday.

The projects are on sites where coal was mined prior to 1977, the year the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act was passed. This federal law, among other things, requires the land to be adequately reclaimed when mining ends.

Funding for the AMLER program comes through the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement, which approves the grants, and the Virginia Department of Energy administers funding for projects in the state. 

“The AMLER program supports high impact projects that align with federal, state and local priorities to improve communities and foster economic development,” state Sen. Todd Pillion, R-Washington County, stated in a release. “This round of funding will provide necessary investments to bolster infrastructure and enhance recreational and commercial opportunities to ensure SWVA continues to be successful.” 

Virginia’s recommended projects are:

  • Project Intersection, Wise County, $4.75 million
  • Richlands Electric Diversification Project, Tazewell County, $2 million
  • Cumberland Outdoor Recreation, Dickenson and Buchanan counties, $2.75 million
  • Project Wildcat, Wise County, $500,000

The funding for Project Intersection will go to build a second entryway into the industrial park, which has four remaining pads totaling about 70 acres available for development, according to Duane Miller, executive director for the LENOWISCO Planning District Commission.

The industrial park is owned by the Lonesome Pine Regional Industrial Facilities Authority, or LPRIFA, which was created through legislation in 2019, and includes representatives from the counties of Dickenson, Lee, Scott and Wise and the City of Norton. Project Intersection is certified as a Tier 5 site, the highest level in the Virginia Economic Development Partnership’s Virginia Business Ready Sites Program tier system.

AMLER has previously provided more than $12 million to develop the industrial park, according to Tarah Kesterson, a spokesperson for the Virginia Department of Energy. 

EarthLink, the Atlanta-based internet service provider owned by Trive Capital, celebrated the opening of a 30,000-square-foot facility at Project Intersection earlier this month.

“It’s going to be a premiere site,” Will Payne, managing partner of Coalfield Strategies, an economic development consulting firm focused on Southwest Virginia, said of Project Intersection. 

Officials in the town of Richlands, which has provided electricity to businesses and citizens since 1922, requested AMLER funding after facing rate increases, according to a Aug. 15 news release from the Virginia Department of Energy. The money will go toward the construction of a natural gas-fired turbine and generator, a micro power plant capable of generating 5 megawatts of electricity — enough to serve the town’s 2,500 utility customers. 

The Cumberland Outdoor Recreation project is the purchase by the Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources of “an easement of 12,900 acres on Nature Conservancy property in Buchanan and Dickenson counties,” according to the Virginia Department of Energy. The land will be used for recreation, including a new ATV trail and road improvements.

The funding for Project Wildcat will pay for a retaining wall around an abandoned mine site in Pound, according to Kesterson.

Virginia began receiving federal grant dollars for the AMLER program in 2017 and has recommended nearly 50 projects since then, including five projects announced in January. Six states and three tribes receive the federal funding. 

Last week, the Appalachian Community Capital community development financial institution announced it had received a $500 million grant from the Environmental Protection Agency to start the Green Bank for Rural America, which plans to finance $1.6 billion in energy projects in the Appalachian region and other rural areas across the country.

SWVA clean energy development could draw $8.5B in investments

Wise County and neighboring localities in Southwest Virginia may become home to a massive clean energy development that could attract up to $8.25 billion in capital investments, Gov. Glenn Youngkin announced Wednesday.

An agreement between Energy DELTA Lab, Dallas-based Fortune 100 energy company Energy Transfer and Wise County will involve the development of 65,000 acres of former coal mining land for “all-of-the-above” energy technology — including natural gas, nuclear, renewable energy and other emerging energy sources. That’s in alignment with the Youngkin-supported Virginia Energy Plan, which aims to fulfill the Virginia Clean Economy Act’s mandates by including a mix of energy sources beyond wind, solar and battery storage supported by Virginia Democrats.

The 2022 Virginia Energy Plan launched the nonprofit Energy DELTA Lab, which will be the primary developer of the Southwest project, and more than a dozen projects are under consideration for the land — they total $8.25 billion in potential private capital investment, according to the governor’s office, and could create 1,650 jobs and generate nearly 1 gigawatt of power. By contrast, Dominion Energy’s Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind project is expected to produce 2.6 gigawatts of power.

Energy Transfer owns the 65,000 acres, which is primarily in Wise County, and owns surface and subsurface rights, while Penn Virginia Operating Co. manages Energy Transfer’s land. Neighboring Lee, Scott and Dickenson counties and the city of Norton also could see development and have projects undergoing due diligence with the DELTA Lab.

Development could include wind, solar, nuclear, hydrogen and pumped storage hydro, as well as energy storage technologies.

“The commonwealth’s power demand is skyrocketing, and now is the time to make strategic investments in energy infrastructure to meet our growing needs,” Youngkin said in a statement. “This agreement will make Virginia energy more reliable, affordable and clean while transforming Southwest Virginia into a hub for innovation.”

The partnership plans to develop energy projects at scale, with its primary goals being creating jobs and local tax revenues. Other goals include creating career pathways for the regional workforce and manufacturing opportunities.

Readying industrial land

The Energy DELTA Lab is currently developing three industrial sites in Wise County, including on land owned by Energy Transfer: the 300-acre “Meade Fork” site, the 2,000-acre “Junction” site and the 4,000-acre “Bullitt” site.

The Meade Fork site is located near the town of Pound, and the Energy DELTA Lab is working with The Nature Conservancy and Sun Tribe Solar to locate a solar energy facility on it. The project received a $975,000 grant from the U.S. Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement’s Abandoned Mine Land Economic Revitalization program, administered by the Virginia Department of Energy.

The Junction site, located near the town of Appalachia, will be a mixed-use development pilot combining four land uses on multiple sites of a singular property, including industrial, clean energy generation, agriculture and conservation uses. The initial focus is developing a 350-acre industrial site for a clean energy project.

The Bullitt site on the border of Lee County could hold multiple industrial projects with adjacent energy sites to power on-site demand, and the complex is situated over abandoned mines that contain nearly 10 billion gallons of water.

The team will develop the Data Center Ridge site on the Bullitt site, converting a 400-acre previously mined property to a 1-gigawatt, multitenant data center campus that will use the planned adjacent clean energy developments.

The lab’s “Oasis Mine-Based Water Cooling System,” an HVAC closed-loop water cooling system that uses water below 55 degrees Fahrenheit in underground mine cavities, can reduce energy requirements and costs for data center cooling. Data Center Ridge has a single deposit of nearly 10 billion gallons of naturally replenishing cold water.

The data center model is based on a 36-megawatt facility that would be owned and operated by the company it supports, such as Amazon Web Services, Alphabet or Microsoft. The 250,000-square-foot model has a raised floor space of 150,000 square feet to house IT equipment and servers, with remaining building space holding office space, telecom equipment, electrical/mechanical rooms, shipping/receiving areas and security.

For Wise County, one 36-megawatt facility is estimated to create $15.7 million in real estate and property tax revenues over the first five years of operation, support 2,048 jobs during the 18-month construction period, and create 40 data center jobs and support 59 additional jobs once data center operations begin, according to a Mangum Economics analysis.

“This is opening up land that otherwise would not be developed,” said Will Payne, managing partner of Coalfield Strategies, director of InvestSWVA and adviser to the Energy DELTA Lab. “That’s a huge game changer for them and their own development and the surrounding area.”

Energy Transfer is the largest operator of natural gas pipelines in the U.S. by revenue, according to Fortune, and reported $89.9 billion in 2022 revenue.

Energy DELTA (Discovery, Education, Learning and Technology Accelerator) Lab is a 501(c)3 nonprofit focused on deploying new and clean energy technologies to diversify Southwest Virginia’s economy and provide energy companies speed to market with testing and project development. The lab is a collaborative effort of energy industry companies, electric utilities, business development initiative InvestSWVA, Southwest Virginia Energy Research and Development Authority and the Virginia Department of Energy.

SWVA projects recommended for $10.6M in federal funds

Eight Southwest Virginia economic development projects totaling $10.6 million have been recommended for federal funding under Virginia’s Abandoned Mine Land Economic Revitalization grant program, Gov. Glenn Youngkin and U.S. Rep. Morgan Griffith announced Friday.

Referred to the federal Office of Surface Mining and Reclamation Enforcement for approval, the projects include $2.347 million to develop a 23.5 acre build-ready pad at the Chip Mill Industrial Site in Dickenson County; $2 million to leverage previously mined properties to support the Energy DELTA Lab in Wise County; and another $2 million to create campsites and connector trails at Devil’s Bathtub in Wise and Scott counties.

Under the Biden administration’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, Virginia already expects to receive $22.7 million in federal funds to reclaim abandoned mine lands during the next 15 years. The Abandoned Mine Land Economic Revitalization, or AMLER, grant program is separate from that in that it seeks to advance economic development opportunities from the development and repurposing of abandoned mine lands. Virginia was one of nine states and tribal programs picked by Congress to receive $10 million in fiscal 2020 under the program. Will Clear, deputy director of the state’s Department of Energy, told Virginia Business that the commonwealth is slated to receive $13 million in federal funds for fiscal 2023.

Other projects recommended for funding include:

  • $525,000 to expand manufacturing at medical supplier Bird Dog Distributors, in Dickenson County;
  • $750,000 to create a sporting complex on abandoned mine land in Dickenson County, including archery, rifle/pistol and shotgun shooting ranges;
  • $1.6 million to create a pad-ready housing development site in Wise County;
  • $500,000 for the expansion of Maine Five Distributors LLC’s sewing operations in Buchanan County; and
  • $925,000 for workforce center upgrades and program expansion of Mountain Empire Community College’s Center for Workforce and Innovation of Appalachia in Wise County.

“These projects selected support our goals of immediate job creation and the development of new business-ready sites that will be the fuel that drives new business investment in these Southwest Virginia communities,” Youngkin said in a statement. “There is great innovation in these proposals that will make Virginia the best place to live, work and raise a family.”

Clear told Virginia Business Friday that he expects a response from the federal mine office on the funding in the first or second quarters of 2023.