The 2020 Virginia Clean Economy Act mandates at least 16,100 megawatts, or just under two-thirds of the state’s electricity, come from solar or offshore wind farms by the end of 2035, and that by 2045, Dominion Energy transition to 100% carbon-free energy sources.

Glenn Youngkin

Gov. Glenn Youngkin last month vetoed twin bills that would have redirected at least 600 megawatts, or 3%, of the 2035 total to come from “previously developed” sites such as parking lots or brownfields that have been contaminated with hazardous waste.

Del. Katrina Callsen, D-Charlottesville, and the identical Senate Bill 1040, sponsored by state Sen. Schuyler VanValkenburg, D-Richmond, had proposed their twin bills as an alternative means of reaching the Clean Economy Act’s benchmarks in the face of rural Virginia localities increasingly saying no to covering their farmland with solar panels.

Isle of Wight and Surry counties each have enacted solar acreage caps. Isle of Wight supervisors in 2023 set the limit at 2% of the county’s prime farm soils, or a maximum of 2,446 acres, roughly 2,200 of which are already spoken for. Surry, in March, set its limit at 7% of the county’s developable land, or 10,695 acres. County officials estimate Surry’s three existing solar farms already account for 6% of the county’s developable acreage.

Youngkin, a Republican, described the bills in his veto statement as trying to “make piecemeal changes to fix the discredited Virginia Clean Economy Act,” and accused Democrats, who hold narrow majorities in both General Assembly chambers, of having “failed to pass legislation that would meaningfully free Virginia’s ratepayers and businesses from this misguided path.”

Youngkin’s veto came a month after the House, in a 67-29 vote, and the Senate, in a 21-19 vote, each rejected a slate of amendments Youngkin had proposed to their respective bills that the bills’ sponsors described as a “poison pill.”

A provision of the Clean Economy Act required utilities to, from 2021 through 2024, procure renewable energy credits, or RECs, from renewable energy sources located within Virginia or the 13-state PJM regional transmission organization in which Virginia participates.   

A renewable energy credit, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, refers to the property rights to one megawatt-hour of electricity generated and delivered to the grid from a renewable source. It’s a method of documenting compliance with a state renewable energy portfolio standard, or RPS, like that found in the Clean Economy Act.  

Youngkin had returned both bills with recommended amendments that would have repealed this requirement through 2028, stating no utility “shall be required to procure and retire RECs for RPS compliance from 2024 through 2027.” It would change from 2025 to 2028 the date when utilities “may only use RECs from RPS eligible sources for compliance.”  

“Dominion is requesting a $2.99 per month rate increase to customers’ bills as part of costs for RPS compliance,” Youngkin said in his veto statement. “In their latest RPS filing, Dominion Energy disclosed that they expected to bill customers $5.5 billion dollars for REC purchases related to RPS compliance costs over the next ten years.

The bills had included a schedule of annual benchmarks detailing what percentage of Dominion’s electricity generation portfolio is to come from renewable sources to reach the 2045 goal, and would have stipulated that it “is the policy of the commonwealth to encourage” energy projects on previously developed sites “to reduce the land use impacts of solar development.” 

“To meet our energy needs, we cannot, and should not, depend on rural Virginia and this bill would have ensured that solar went in the suburban and urban areas where everyone agrees it belongs,” VanValkenburg said in a joint March 28 news release with Callsen. “By putting a poison pill amendment on this bill, the Governor is putting more pressure on rural localities, costing us jobs and entrepreneurial potential, and ensuring the ratepayer has to shoulder more responsibility for energy production.”