Energy storage projects slated for Greensville, Pittsylvania

Two energy storage projects proposed for Southern Virginia would help augment the area’s power capacity, diversify the region’s tax base and boost the regional economy, industry representatives say.

Dominion Energy Virginia wants to build a liquified natural gas storage facility on more than 20 acres that the Richmond-based Fortune 500 utility owns next to its Greensville County natural gas power plant, straddling the line with Brunswick County, according to a June filing with the Virginia State Corporation Commission. The $548 million facility, which would open in late 2027, would employ 400 construction-related workers and culminate in six full-time jobs, bringing $17.5 million to the local economy, and boosting combined county tax revenues by $35.5 million over 25 years, according to Dominion.

The storage facility would provide backup fuel supply for Dominion’s Greensville and Brunswick power stations during periods of extreme weather or peak demand, enough to power 700,000 homes in the region for up to four days, says Dominion spokesperson Jeremy Slayton. He points to Winter Storm Elliot, which in December 2022 knocked out power for millions of electricity customers along the Eastern Seaboard, as well an early 2021 deep freeze in Texas that led to hundreds of deaths and billions of dollars in economic losses.

“We see those types of incidents happening, and we know that we can’t allow that to happen for our customers,” Slayton says.

Separately, in July, North Carolina-based Strata Clean Energy received approval from the Danville-Pittsylvania Regional Industrial Authority to lease 85 acres at the 3,528-acre Southern Virginia Megasite at Berry Hill to build a lithium-ion battery storage facility on an up-to-4-acre pad that would connect to an Appalachian Power substation.

Strata Director of Development Adam Thompson says the project, which would employ only a handful of workers, is in a “holding pattern” while economic development officials work to attract other customers to Berry Hill, but construction could start in 2026.

Although both projects won’t create many permanent jobs, those positions will likely be well-paying for the region, says Bryan David, program director for the University of Virginia’s Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service. Localities in Southern Virginia are working “as hard as [they] can to transform the economy” by diversifying their tax bases, he says, and “these types of investments are incrementally one more step toward that goal.”