Drivers and Inhibitors of Virginia's Energy Transition: Institutional and Community Factors Shaping Solar Permitting

• In Event: State and Local Energy and Climate Governance

Abstract

The United States' federalist structure grants states substantial authority over energy policy, and that authority now carries outsized weight as the federal government's role in climate leadership contracts. Virginia illustrates the stakes of state-led action. The 2020 Virginia Clean Economy Act (VCEA) mandates 100% renewable electricity by 2050 and 16,100 MW of solar and onshore wind by 2035, while statewide electricity demand is projected to rise as much as 200% by 2040, largely due to data center growth. Because onshore wind potential is limited, utility-scale solar has become the de facto pathway to meeting these targets. It already supplies over 85% of Virginia's installed solar capacity. Yet project approval rates have fallen from 76% to 56% between 2020 and 2026, while denials have climbed from 8% to 29% since 2019, signaling an increasingly contested local permitting environment that threatens the VCEA's viability and Virginia's broader energy and economic competitiveness.

This study asks: how do procedural, institutional, and community factors influence utility-scale solar permitting outcomes and timelines in Virginia? Despite a growing descriptive literature on solar siting governance, no empirical research has quantitatively evaluated how permitting process dynamics and community involvement jointly shape project viability across multiple cases. Two hypotheses guide the work: projects with greater community benefits, community engagement, and local government involvement and preparedness are associated with (H1) higher approval rates and (H2) shorter permitting timelines.

The analysis covers all ≥50 MW solar projects proposed in Virginia to date (n = 154), drawn from the University of Virginia Weldon Cooper Center's Virginia Solar Database and supplemented by zoning and energy ordinances, siting agreements, local meeting minutes and agendas, permit applications, and news coverage. Variables span legally and non-legally binding community benefit frameworks; monetary benefits (tax revenue, grants, land lease payments) and non-monetary benefits (employment, infrastructure); engagement proxies (public hearings, outreach plans, prior developer activity); local ordinances and siting agreements; and locality demographics, project size, and geography.

The research employs a mixed-methods design. Quantitative analysis begins with correlation and regression models, ANOVA, and nonparametric equivalents where statistical assumptions hold, escalating to random forest machine learning models for high-dimensional or nonlinear relationships. To accommodate variables that resist standardization, particularly community engagement, and to identify combinations of conditions that jointly produce outcomes, the study incorporates fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis, which isolates configurations of procedural, institutional, and community attributes that are sufficient or necessary for project approval and shorter timelines.

Preliminary evidence suggests that non-monetary community benefits are associated with more active developer–community engagement and reduced local opposition, and that localities with pre-established energy ordinances and siting agreements tend toward higher approval rates and shorter permitting timelines. These patterns, while provisional, indicate that procedural certainty and substantive community engagement, not simply larger financial payments, may be decisive in moving solar projects from proposal to operation. The findings will inform state legislative guidance, local ordinance design, and developer engagement strategies, and will help answer a broader federalism question: which configurations of state and local policy actually deliver the clean energy transition?

Author

• Luke Michael Goodman, Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University
  Presenting Author