Crossed wires over regional power expansion

As data centers and power usage become ever more intensely debated topics in Northern Virginia, it’s no surprise that a new transmission line could ruffle feathers.

Dominion Energy has proposed a 500-kilovolt transmission line to run from its Morrisville substation in Fauquier County through parts of Prince William and Loudoun counties to the planned Wishing Star substation. Estimated to cost $852.9 million, the project also would bring in a new 230-kilovolt line in Fauquier, and the Morrisville substation would be expanded.

Loudoun County supervisors said in July that they were in support of the 500-kilovolt line as long as it stayed on the current proposed route, as opposed to an alternative route that the utility was considering. Now the two lines must be approved by the Virginia State Corporation Commission, which will hear public testimony at two hearings Sept. 18 and Sept. 25 at Rock Ridge High School in Ashburn.

The project is one of several proposals by Dominion Energy to add more high-voltage cables that deliver electricity from generation sources to end users — often data centers, which are increasingly opposed by residents in Northern Virginia and elsewhere.

That is the case for the Morrisville to Wishing Star line, which would place monopoles across farmland, to bring more power to Prince William and Loudoun data centers. Piedmont Environmental Council and other regional organizations came out in May to a meeting in Bealeton to oppose the plan.

“Residents and other businesses should never be saddled with the business expenses of the richest companies in the world,” says Chris Miller, president of the Piedmont Environmental Council.

Still, data centers bring in significant tax revenue and are deemed necessary to handle additional internet traffic spurred by artificial intelligence’s boom, proponents say.

Data center development in Virginia is estimated to bring in about $9.1 billion in economic activity and 74,000 jobs annually, while also padding local coffers to the tune of an estimated $895 million in real and personal property tax revenue for last fiscal year, which has a projected budget of $940 million.

The state’s Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission report released late last year found that if data center development didn’t have constraints, the industry could triple energy demand in Virginia over the next 15 years.