Dominion completes $2.6B sale of stake in offshore wind farm

Dominion Energy has completed its $2.6 billion sale of a 50% noncontrolling stake in its Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind project to investor Stonepeak, the Fortune 500 utility announced Tuesday.

This transaction and several other recent sales reduce Dominion’s debt by approximately $21 billion, meeting a goal the utility set in a recent business review, according to its news release Wednesday.

The Stonepeak deal was announced in February and was estimated at nearly $3 billion, a number that went down to $2.6 billion at closing. Dominion will retain full operational control of construction and operations of the $9.8 billion CVOW project, under construction 27 miles off the coast of Virginia Beach. As of August, the 50th monopile foundation for CVOW’s 174 turbines was installed, and Dominion officials said in October the project, set to be complete in 2026, is on time and on budget.

Dominion’s deal with Stonepeak improves its estimated 2024 consolidated FFO-to-debt by approximately 1%, as well as lowering risks and reducing its overall financing needs during the wind farm’s construction.

Dominion has announced several acquisitions and sales over the past year:

• In July, a Dominion subsidiary announced its plan to purchase the 40,000-acre Kitty Hawk North Wind offshore wind lease from Avangrid for $160 million.
• In August, the utility won a 176,505-acre lease about 35 nautical miles from the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay for a $17.65 million bid in a Bureau of Ocean Energy Management auction.
• Last year, Dominion sold its remaining interest in the Cove Point natural gas liquefaction facility in Maryland to Berkshire Hathaway Energy for $3.5 billion.
• In March, the utility completed its sale of East Ohio Gas to Canadian pipeline and energy company Enbridge for $6.6 billion.
• In June, Dominion sold subsidiaries Questar Gas and Wexpro to Enbridge for $4.3 billion.
• Earlier this month, Dominion closed on its $3.2 billion sale of the Gastonia, North Carolina, natural gas utility Public Service Co. of North Carolina to Enbridge.

“We are pleased to partner with Stonepeak on CVOW, which continues to proceed on-time and on-budget, consistent with our previously communicated timing and cost expectations,” Dominion Chair, President and CEO Bob Blue said in a statement. “Stonepeak is one of the world’s largest infrastructure investors in large energy projects such as offshore wind, and its financial participation in CVOW will benefit both the project and the people who will rely on electricity from CVOW to keep the lights on and fuel economic growth in the commonwealth.”

Stonepeak, headquartered in New York, will fund 50% of remaining project costs, according to the statement.