Ghiorzi Family Tells SCC to Reject Dominion’s IRP: Co-Locate Generation or Make Data Centers Pay for Underground HVDC

LOVETTSVILLE, Va. — Four Ghiorzi households put the same demand in front of Virginia’s State Corporation Commission that western Loudoun keeps repeating in transmission dockets: if data centers want 24/7 power in a 30-square-mile pocket, build the generation where the load sits — or make the campuses pay to bury the wires.

In April 8, 2025 comments on Case No. PUR-2024-00184 (Dominion Energy Virginia’s 2024 Integrated Resource Plan), Theresa Ann Ghiorzi, Alfred T. and Irene Ghiorzi, Thomas and Joyce Ghiorzi, and Alfred P. and Mary Ghiorzi of Lovettsville ask the Commission to reject the IRP. Their lead reason is generation geography. Data centers, they write, are the sole cause of the demand spike; most sit in Loudoun; the plan offers no baseload generation planned for Loudoun itself. Co-location on campus — or shared microgrid generation nearby — is the only equitable fix. They count only one Loudoun data center out of more than 200 with its own co-located generation: a 132 MW gas plant.

The second count attacks PJM’s “multi-driver” label on 500 kV and 765 kV “extension cords” from West Virginia coal plants. Without projected data-center load, they argue, the lines would not be needed; the multi-driver tag lets costs socialize across ratepayers in all 13 PJM states while private landowners along the routes absorb socio-economic devastation and get no benefit. Data-center operators preach net-zero and oppose fossil generation in Virginia, the comments say, yet ratepayers are being conscripted to rebuild paths to 50- and 60-year-old coal plants on the campuses’ schedule. Wait for preferred in-state generation, or build on-site the way campuses already install diesel backup.

Rate shock is the third thread. The family cites Dominion residential bills rising around September 1, 2024 to roughly $143 per 1,000 kWh (from about $116), then April 1, 2025 applications seeking roughly $21 more on that bill — a 15% base-rate hike for about 2.7 million customers plus about a 50% jump in fuel and purchased-power charges — alongside offshore-wind riders, RECs, and a Chesterfield peaker surcharge before that plant is even built. They note Chesterfield’s approved ~1,000 MW gas unit is peaking, not 24/7 baseload. Dominion’s IRP, they write, projects more than $100 billion in costs as demand roughly doubles over 15 years — a wealth transfer from working families to trillion-dollar hyperscalers.

On Dominion’s own SCC-directed 2024 IRP supplement, projects marked “M” are described as multi-driver regional reliability / mixed-load / generation-deliverability awards that “may be driven by increased loads within a region (including those from data centers) but cannot be directly attributed to a specific customer type.” The Ghiorzis call that true as prose and deceptive as policy: the only driver of Northern Virginia’s surge is data centers, and Dominion is “fixing” reliability problems it creates by accepting contracts it cannot fulfill on the promised timeline. They also flag a PJM capacity-auction shock — Dominion-zone bids for guaranteed megawatts jumping to $444 from a prior $20–$270 range — and blame data-center demand plus VCEA limits on in-state generation among other factors. Dominion’s own figure cited in the comments: data-center demand reaching 5.34 GW in coming years.

The remedy list is familiar from the underground-HVDC fight but aimed at the IRP: separate the data-center end-use class from load forecasts so residential customers stop carrying business wants; require data centers to pay the entire cost of additional baseload; if energy must be imported, require underground HVDC (they cite trenches on the order of 5–6 feet and Northeast / Midwest merchant precedents such as CHPE, Neptune, Hudson, New England Clean Power Link, and SOO Green) with campuses paying the delta versus overhead HVAC; route along highways where possible. PJM, they say, dismisses HVDC as too costly without ever publishing a side-by-side against similarly sited HVAC plus the economic cost of thousands of acres taken.

Across Virginia, the majority of votes placing data centers into zoning maps and by-right pathways have come primarily from Democrats. Loudoun’s Democratic board filled the map the IRP now treats as destiny — more than 200 existing campuses and 117-plus in the pipeline, in a county the commenters say already hosts enough of the world’s internet traffic. Their closing question is blunt: what happens when the Commonwealth runs out of other people’s power and the campuses run out of other people’s money? Until the SCC forces co-located baseload or buried, campus-funded imports, they want the IRP rejected.

Email the Board of Supervisors at:
Phyllis J. Randall (Chair, At-Large) – Phyllis.Randall@loudoun.gov,
Michael R. Turner (Vice Chair, Ashburn District) – Mike.Turner@loudoun.gov,
Juli E. Briskman (Algonkian District) – Juli.Briskman@loudoun.gov,
Sylvia R. Glass (Broad Run District) – Sylvia.Glass@loudoun.gov,
Caleb Kershner (Catoctin District) – caleb.kershner@loudoun.gov,
Matthew F. Letourneau (Dulles District) – Matt.Letourneau@loudoun.gov,
Kristen C. Umstattd (Leesburg District) – Kristen.Umstattd@loudoun.gov,
Laura A. TeKrony (Little River District) – Laura.TeKrony@loudoun.gov,
Koran Saines (Sterling District) – Koran.Saines@loudoun.gov

Email the Loudoun County School Board:
April Chandler, april.chandler@lcps.org,
Anne Donohue, anne.donohue@lcps.org,
Deana Griffiths, deana.griffiths@lcps.org,
Ross Svenson, ross.stevenson@lcps.org,
Kari LaBell, kari.labell@lcps.org,
Jon Pepper, jonathon.pepper@lcps.org,
Lauren Shernoff, lauren.shernoff@lcps.org,
Sumera Rashid, sumera.rashid@lcps.org,
Amy Riccardi, amy.riccardi@lcps.org,