How would you feel if you found out the electric company was coming by your house, seizing a bunch of your property and building a massive power pole right in your backyard? That’s exactly what appears to be happening to a Virginia woman who has learned Dominion Energy might use eminent domain to snatch up part of her yard and put a power pole in it that’s taller than the Statue of Liberty.
Dominion also wants to run that high voltage line right by two schools.
In Ashburn’s “data center alley,” the utility work to keep the electricity flowing is cutting through backyards and school yards.
Vicky Hu might have just lost a battle that she’s fought tooth and nail for more than a year. She gazes from her deck into the backyard of her Ashburn home, where a high voltage transmission line could be built right through her property. The State Corporation Commission (SCC), an agency that regulates utilities, has given Dominion Energy the green light to do so.
“Last year, we were living in hell,” she said.
Her beautiful Loudoun Valley Estates neighborhood is in the heart of “data center alley,” where Dominion says it needs to connect substations with high-voltage lines.
The utility had proposed several possible paths for the so-called Golden to Mars project. The SCC approved a plan June 29 that’s set to snatch Hu’s property from her and plant a 185-foot tall power pole right on her property.
“This is why they push it so hard to go through the community, because once they come through one community, they can go through every communities, because human life has no value to them,” Hu said.
The transmission line would carve a 100-to-150 foot path through her yard. It would gobble up about 1/3 of her property, and she says the path would also cut down about 400 trees on her property alone.
But this line would be more than eight miles long in total.
The next stop for the Golden to Mars line would be right through, or possibly adjacent to, Rosa Lee Elementary School and Rock Ridge High School.
The county called the school board out of its summer recess for an emergency meeting on Monday night because the board would have to approve any high voltage transmission line on its property.
“It’s going to have a great deal of impact on everybody in this community, and it is very difficult to stand here and realize how close it is to the schools and where the students are all day,” Loudoun County School Board Chair April Chandler said.
There are multiple routes being considered, including:
- Route 3A, which would run through Hu’s yard and around the schools
- Route 4, which would dodge Hu’s and her neighbors’ properties but would cut closer to the schools
“The SCC has made a decision. Their decision is essentially 3A,” Chandler said.
Dominion Energy told News4 even though the SCC approved route 3A, it would still need the school board’s approval to build either route.
Chandler said there is an appeals period and the board could pursue legal recourse.
Data centers have pumped billions of dollars into Loudoun County’s coffers, but they’re draining Virginia’s energy grid. Just this month, Dominion Energy sent a letter to customers, warning them about increases of about $8 per month.
“People are angry with data centers, because we’ve been sacrificed. Our rights have been sacrificed,” Hu said.
The utility that’s about to cost more money might also take her land, and it seems there’s nothing she can do to stop it.
Loudoun County’s special school board meeting is set for 5:30 p.m. Monday at Rock Ridge High School.
The board chair has invited the community to come out and weigh in.
Dominion Energy said it will have representatives present at Rock Ridge to answer questions.
