Dominion Virginia Power is seeking approval to develop 56 megawatts of solar farms that would begin producing renewable energy by December of 2016.
The company filed an application with the Virginia State Corporation Commission for certificates of public convenience and necessity for three separate solar projects that would be located in Powhatan, Louisa and Isle of Wight counties. The total cost of the three projects is expected to be about US$129.5 million, excluding financing costs.
The projects include the 17-MW Scott Solar, the 20-MW Whitehouse Solar and 19-MW Woodland Solar: farms.
“These three projects represent the next step in Dominion’s commitment to build 400 megawatts of large-scale solar by 2020,” said David A. Christian, chief executive officer for Dominion Generation. “Combined with our proposed solar facility near Remington, we are expecting to build 76 megawatts of solar in 2016 as we continue moving forward to put more renewable energy on the grid for our customers.”
The three projects were shown to be beneficial to customers as a result of a competitive Request for Proposals the company issued in July. The company also is pursuing power purchase agreements with other solar developers as a result of the RFP.
If approved by the SCC, construction would start in the second quarter of 2016.