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CTB Approves $4 Billion Interstate 64 Project

The CTB approved Option A, one of four options, to relieve chronic congestion on Interstate 64 and the Hampton Roads Bridge-Tunnel.

Wow! The Commonwealth Transportation Board  approved yesterday a $4 billion plan to expand the Hampton Roads Bridge-Tunnel and widen twelve miles of Interstate 64 from four lanes to six. Said Transportation Secretary Aubrey Layne after the vote: “Historic day for…

Food Pantries, the Latest College Craze

An increasing number of college food pantries in Virginia provide emergency rations to hungry students. Photo credit: VCU’s Rampantry

There’s a new wrinkle on the college affordability crisis. Some students are so strapped for cash that colleges are setting up food pantries. As CNN reports, membership in the College and University Food Bank Alliance has quadrupled in the past two years to 398…

Good news! We think we have restored the Bacon’s Rebellion blog to full functionality. Things should be working more smoothly now. However, we’re still suffering after-effects of the Denial of Service attack and our efforts (far more complicated than we anticipated) to migrate the blog to a faster, more secure platform.

What’s in it for you?

Subscriptions. Bacon’s Rebellionoffers three ways for…

How Fast Is Electricity Usage Growing — a Multibillion Dollar Question

by James A. Bacon

Last week Dominion Virginia Power issued a press release highlighting the fact that persistent hot, humid weather in July, August and September had set a three-month electricity-usage record for its service territory and the electric cooperatives that are part of its system.

Over those three months customers used 28.2 million megawatt hours of electricity. That represented a…

Digging Deeper on the Link Between Spending and Educational Achievement

A few days ago I posted datashowing that K-12 spending in Virginia was 10.2% lower in 2014 than it was in 2008, yet National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) scores for Virginia students had climbed over the same period. Given the evidence that Virginia schools showed they could do more with less, I asked, is it possible that money is not the main constraint holding back educational…

A Sinking Feeling at Naval Station Norfolk

The concrete piers at the Naval Station Norfolk are a lot more complex than the rickety wooden structures lining the waterfront down at the Rivah. Electric lines and steam pipes on the underbelly of the piers conduct power to the giant warships at dock. When water levels rise high enough, propelled by tides, storm surges and ocean winds, water can immerse the pipes. Base officials cut off…

Chart of the Day: Virginia 4th, 8th Graders Excel at Science

Source: Virginia Department of Education

Virginia 4th- and 8th-grade public school students out-performed their peers by wide margins in the 2015 National Assessment of Educational Progress, according to a press release issued yesterday by the Virginia Department of Education.

“Virginia’s science standards require students to investigate and understand scientific concepts and then apply what they…

Merchant Power Plant Proposed for Charles City County

Merchant power plant in Hanover County.

Another independent power producer has filed an application to build a combined-cycle, gas-fired power plant in Virginia. C4GT, managed by Michigan-based NOVI Energy, proposes to locate a 1,060 megawatt power plant in Charles City County.

In a filing with the State Corporation Commission, C4GT stated that the facility “will promote the public interest by,…

A New Book Examines the Virginia Way

by Peter Galuszka

Over the past several years, Virginia has seen plenty of high drama and low politics.

There was the tawdry corruption trial of former governor Robert F. McDonnell (R) and his wife, Maureen. At the University of Virginia, Teresa Sullivan, the school’s popular president, was temporarily ousted in a mysterious coup. Everywhere were unlimited amounts of political money, revolving…

Thinking Correctly about Corrections

Source: “State of the Region: Hampton Roads 2016.”

by James A. Bacon

In 2015 the Commonwealth of Virginia spent $1.13 billion operating state prisons holding 25,000 inmates. Is the state spending too much imprisoning people, or too little? Could it spend the money better? Those are questions we need to ask as Virginia faces a future of chronic fiscal stress. As I have blogged previously, we need…

Hexavalent Chromium May Be Endemic in Piedmont Well Water

by James A. Bacon

Hexavalent chromium, a potent carcinogen, is detectable in 90% of the North Carolina water wells sampled in a Duke University research study, and in many cases exceeds levels deemed safe for drinking water.

The chemical, made famous by the movie “Erin Brockovich,” originates not from coal ash ponds but from the natural leaching of mostly volcanic rock in aquifers across the…

Chart of the Day: Revenue per Hotel Room

Source: “State of the Region: Hampton Roads 2016”

As Virginia casts around for an industry to lead the way in economic growth, don’t look to the hotel sector. Hotels in Virginia have severely under-performed the national average as measured by a key indicator, revenue earned per available room (REVPAR). The chart above, taken from the “State of the Region: Hampton Roads 2016” compares the change…

Introducing a Novel Concept: Cost per Ton of CO2 Reduced

by James A. Bacon

A new Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy paper about the impact of a Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) on Virginia warrants close examination. You may or may not accept the study’s conclusion that implementing a requirement for 6% solar and wind in Virginia’s electricity mix by 2025 would increase electricity rates in Virginia by 9.85%, depress gross state product by…

Give It Up, Dudes, There’s Nothing There

The McCabe family

by James A. Bacon

The Wall Street Journal editorial page has doubled down on the newspaper’s insinuation that Governor Terry McAuliffe’s financial support for state senatorial candidate Jill McCabe was somehow linked to her husband Andrew McCabe’s handling of the FBI investigation into Hillary Clinton’s private email server. Drawing upon the Journal’snews report the previous…

The Peninsula’s Infrastructure Bottleneck

The Virginia Peninsula: utility bottleneck

by James A. Bacon

I don’t envy the poor blokes in charge of economic development for the Virginia Peninsula. The Newport News-Hampton-Williamsburg area has major infrastructure issues — constrained electricity, water and gas capacity — that are hindering economic growth. Any one of these deficiencies would put the 500,000-person sub-region of Hampton…

Virginia as Free Speech Zone

Free speech zone at George Mason University

Three Virginia universities received high rankings in the Heterodox Academy Guide to Collegesfor their commitment to diverse viewpoints. The University of Chicago and Purdue University garner the top “heterodoxy” scores for freedom from politically correct strictures on speech, but the University of Virginia, College of William & Mary and George Mason…

What’s the Hold-up on the Surry-Skiffes Permit?

Yorktown Power Station. Photo credit: Daily Press

by James A. Bacon

In the late summer of 2015, Dominion Virginia Power issued grave warnings that residents and businesses of the Williamsburg-Newport News area could face electricity blackouts if the power company didn’t quickly receive permits to build the proposed 500 kV Surry-Skiffes Creek transmission line. When Dominion shuts down its aging,…