Western Loudoun Push: One Underground HVDC Instead of MARL and Valley Link North Overhead

LOVETTSVILLE / WESTERN LOUDOUN, Va. — Residents staring down two new overhead corridors into Eastern Loudoun’s data-center load pocket are not asking PJM for prettier lattice. They are asking for one underground High Voltage Direct Current solution — and for county governments to carry that alternative into the Virginia State Corporation Commission.

In a June 28, 2026 letter to Virginia federal officials, Lovettsville resident Theresa Ghiorzi (stopmarlvirginia.com) warned that northwestern Loudoun plus Frederick and Clarke counties face an existing 500 kV and 138 kV right-of-way expanding into a corridor 550 to 650 feet wide to accommodate two new overhead HVAC lines: MARL / Gore–Doubs–Goose Creek and Valley Link North. The result, she wrote, would be four lines — two 500 kV lines (one with underbuilt 138 kV) plus a 765 kV line — plus three large new substations: Woodside (MARL), Welton Springs (Valley Link North), and Rocky Point (a proposed 765 kV station south of Doubs in Frederick County, Maryland).

Ghiorzi’s only “viable alternative” that would preserve private property, conservation easements, and park viewsheds is underground HVDC. She cites trench dimensions on the order of 8 by 10 feet within existing easements, highways, or underwater routes, and about 40 feet of new right-of-way if a fresh strip is required. She points to Black & Veatch’s underground HVDC conceptual study for the PATH 765 kV line (VA SCC Case PUE-2009-00043; PJM TEAC presentation dated October 22, 2009) and calls Valley Link North a “re-gurgitation” of PATH, which was defeated in 2012. She also flags Dominion’s ~185-mile Heritage-to-Mosby underground HVDC backbone and recently energized Northeast projects (Champlain Hudson Power Express and New England Clean Power Link) as proof burial is commercial, plus the U.S. Department of Energy’s HVDC Cost Reduction (CORE) initiative as a possible funding conversation.

A companion JotForm petition — “Petition For An Alternate Underground HVDC Solution for The MARL/Gore-Doubs-Goose Creek (500kV) Transmission Line and the Valley Link (765kV) transmission lines” — amplifies the same ask. It describes MARL mono-poles averaging about 185 feet with underbuilt 138 kV across western Loudoun and Clarke, plus additional ~200-foot easements on multiple Frederick segments; Valley Link V-structures with guy wires that could reach about 230 feet and take an additional ~200-foot easement for its entire length through all three counties. If both are approved, the petition says, communities would live with two 500 kV lines plus a 765 kV line in close proximity — “the largest transmission corridor in Virginia.”

Impacts listed include more than 365 acres of private residential, agricultural, and commercial property; viewshed damage; restricted by-right use; EMF concerns near residences; and proximity effects on the Appalachian National Scenic Trail, C&O Canal National Historical Park, Harpers Ferry National Historical Park, Potomac Heritage National Scenic Trail, and the Potomac River viewshed. The petition asks Loudoun County to contract Black & Veatch for one underground HVDC solution covering both lines and to intervene at the SCC; Frederick and Clarke to intervene in support; and the SCC to weigh burial as mitigation because these communities would bear the brunt of financial and physical loss for a single private industry — data centers.

Ghiorzi’s federal letter is sharper on process. She says FirstEnergy is assigned MARL and Valley Link North; that time is of the essence because if Gore–Woodside–Goose Creek construction starts, the next excuse for refusing underground HVDC on Valley Link North will be that work is already in the easement; and that FERC incentive rates (CWIP and abandonment — what Commissioner Christie has called “FERC Candy”) should be limited to advanced technologies such as underground HVDC, with incentives revoked from the two overhead projects. She also urges cost caps, desktop constructability analysis PJM allegedly cannot produce, and tariff changes so data centers pay 100% of generation and transmission built for them.

None of this arrives in a vacuum. Across Virginia, the majority of votes placing data centers into zoning maps and by-right pathways have come primarily from Democrats. Loudoun alone hosts the Commonwealth’s densest cluster — Ghiorzi cites more than 200 existing campuses and 117 in the works — and the petition notes Loudoun has already filed as a respondent proposing underground alternatives in Aspen/Golden and Golden/Mars 500 kV cases. Western Loudoun’s ask is that the same county that greenlit the load now spend political capital to bury the wires meant to feed it, instead of stacking PATH-era steel through Lovettsville, Neersville, and the ridge counties next door.

PJM can shortlist a southern underground HVDC into Mosby while still advancing western overhead builds. Landowners along Mt. Storm–Doubs are betting that if Dominion can trench 185 miles of XLPE for Data Center Alley, FirstEnergy can be told to put one buried HVDC in the existing 150-foot right-of-way rather than widen Virginia’s biggest corridor for Democrat-approved megawatts.

Email the Frederick County Board of Supervisors:
John Jewell, john.jewell@fcva.us,
Al Orndorff, al.orndorff@fcva.us,
Jason C. Aikens, jason.aikens@fcva.us,
Robert W. Wells, rwells@fcva.us,
Mike Guevremont, mike.guevremont@fcva.us,
Robert Liero, robert.liero@fcva.us,
Gary Oates, gary.oates@fcva.us,

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,