Chesterfield County decides to not take up zoning appeal for Dominion’s natural gas plant

Attendees at a rally against Dominion's proposed natural gas plant. (Charlie Paullin/Virginia Mercury)

Chesterfield County has denied an appeal to overturn a land use decision for Dominion’s proposed natural gas plant, but community members say they aren’t giving up.

Friends of Chesterfield, the group fighting the project, was appealing the county administrator’s determination that a natural gas plant at Dominion’s old coal-fired Chesterfield Power Station on Coxendale Road would comply with local zoning requirements because of a 2010 conditional use permit that allows an electric power plant to go there.

Dominion initially proposed the 1,000 megawatt natural gas peaker plant, called the Chesterfield Energy Reliability Center, for the James River Industrial Park on Battery Brooke Parkway, but began looking into using the Chesterfield Power Station as part of its due diligence.

That diligence includes evaluating existing transmission infrastructure at the Coxendale Road site and two natural gas combustion turbines that remain after the utility retired the coal units there. The retired coal units also would need to be decommissioned and demolished, said Dominion spokesperson Jeremy Slayton.

Friends of Chesterfield had argued that the conditional use permit relied on circumstances for the former coal plant that are different from what the new plant may consist of. They also argued the new plant could potentially need 170-foot high smokestacks, which would be 20 feet above the county’s 150 foot height limit.

In denying the appeal, the Chesterfield County Board of Zoning Appeals wrote without a site plan for the former coal plant site being submitted, “the actual height of the proposed smokestacks is speculative.”

Friends of Chesterfield see that statement as a victory.

“By its own admission, the county’s position that the Chesterfield Energy Reliability Center is consistent with applicable local ordinances is based on zero project specifics,” said Glen Besa, chairperson of the Friends of Chesterfield. ”As we consider future legal moves, Friends of Chesterfield will continue to push for a public hearing and a formal decision from the Board of Supervisors on the suitability of the project.”

The local approvals are needed as part of the air permit approval process with the Department of Environmental Quality, which is currently under review , and that process has provided Friends of Chesterfield with an ally.

The Southern Environmental Law Center sent DEQ letter stating the zoning approval for the former coal site shouldn’t apply to the air permit application Dominion has submitted because the utility’s request is for a different site, though the two are adjacent to each other.

In an interview, SELC Staff Attorney Rachel James said applying the local zoning compliance and site suitability determinations for an air permit application at the former coal plant site that hasn’t been submitted yet would be “premature,” since no specifics of what may constitute the plant, such as the height of the smoke stacks that determine how emissions impact the immediate surrounding community, are known.

“You can’t consider that if you don’t know what it is,” James said.

In response to a question about that concern, DEQ spokeswoman Irina Calos said, “ Zoning compliance and a site suitability determination are required components of a complete air permit application.”

“If necessary, there may be a need to remodel the air permit for a different site,” Calos also said.

Dominion is proposing the natural gas plant alongside a suite of renewable sources as part of its latest integrated resource plan, a non-binding long term plan to meet future energy demands, which are expected to grow by 5% each year for the next 15 years because of data center development.

The plant would fire during peak demand for electricity, giving it the “peaker plant” name.

Although the state follows the Virginia Clean Economy Act, a 2020 landmark law seeking to decarbonize the grid by mid-century, a provision allows Dominion to ask its regulators, the State Corporation Commission, to keep a fossil fuel generation source online out of concern to reliably provide power to the grid.

“We don’t have an exact timeframe, but we will make a decision soon,” Slayton said. “ Time is of the essence.”

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