Plaza 500 Data Center Foes Urge Residents To Attend Tuesday Night Substation Info Meeting

ALEXANDRIA, VA – A coalition of dozens of civic organizations, environmental advocates and local officials is asking Fairfax County’s Land Use and Planning Commissions to reject the public facilities application for the proposed Plaza 500 data center.

They’re urging county residents and anyone interested in the impact the center could have on their lives to attend a Tuesday night presentation by Dominion Energy to the Mason District Land Use Committee on the project and make their opinions heard.

Data Center, Substation Within 100 Feet Of Neighborhoods

The proposed data center is a project by Starwood Capital Group planned for 6299 Edsall Road in Lincolnia, Fairfax County, near the Alexandria city line. The data center would need an electricity supply, which is where Dominion’s substation comes in.

Opponents of the project say opposition to the substation right now is their best hope for blocking the center, because the data center itself has been able to skip permitting processes as a by-right development in the area, which is zoned for light and moderate industry.

The opposition stems from the proximity of the planned data center and substation to the surrounding neighborhoods and parks, which in some areas would be well under 100 feet from residential areas.

Virginia law requires public facilities, including electrical substations, to have a public hearing and review to determine their compatibility with area guidelines established in Fairfax County’s Comprehensive Plan. The process is known as a Public Facilities 2232 Review. “For the proposed Plaza 500 data center campus, this application (2232-2025-MA-00007) will be the one and only time the public has an opportunity to weigh in,” the Save Bren Mar Coalition, which opposes the project, noted in a press release ahead of Tuesday’s meeting.

Plaza 500 Represents An Exception, Opponents Say

“What we are hoping for is that the community will show up, be able to hear … Dominion's perspective on what this substation is for and what it's needed for, and importantly… be able to ask questions and raise concerns about this specific project and where they want it to go, in such close proximity to residents,” Tyler Ray, founder of the Save Bren Mar Coalition and president of the Bren Pointe Homeowners’ Association, told Patch. Specifically, they want to hear why Dominion isn’t considering putting the new substation at the existing Van Dorn substation, which is less than half a mile away.

In reality, Ray says, the community already has the answer: it would cost Dominion more.

“If Dominion wanted to put it at the Van Dorn substation, they could. But as the State Corporation Commission record told us, it will cost them about $50 million to retrofit the Van Dorn substation than to just simply build it on a new flat piece of property at the Plaza 500 site.” The State Corporation Commission regulates utilities and other entities in Virginia.

In December, the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors rejected a rule change backed by its own planning commission that would have required electrical substations to be 200 feet from homes.

Data Centers And Fairfax County's Comprehensive Plan

However, substation locations still have to be deemed consistent with the county’s comprehensive plan. This one clearly isn’t, Ray says. “They aren’t co-locating it at the Van Dorn substation, which is what the committee recommends. They're not proposing to put the transmission lines, the required connecting vehicle to the substation, underground or away from sensitive environmental areas, like a resource protection area, which they're running right through.”

Not only is the substation inconsistent with the county’s comprehensive plan, but it’s unlike the last five data center substation applications approved by the county, he said. Those other stations are on average more than 3,000 feet from residential areas, according to Save Bren Mar, and all in more industrial zoning districts.

In February, the coalition asked the county to propose swapping the Plaza 500 plot for another one Starwood wanted, and use the Plaza 500 site for affordable housing. The idea was rejected.

'A Dangerous Precedent'

The Save Bren Mar Coalition warns that the county could be poised to set a dangerous precedent. “To approve this application would set a dangerous precedent for future 2232 decisions across the county. This project represents an unprecedented utility in-fill development; nowhere else in the county has a substation of this magnitude been dropped in such close proximity to homes in an existing neighborhood. While other large substations exist near dwellings, those utility sites were there long before the homes were built and would not have been allowed to be sited that close today,” it says.

Dominion Energy will present its plans to the Mason District Land Use Committee tonight at 7:30 p.m. in the main community room of the Mason District Governmental Center at 6507 Columbia Pike in Annandale.

The land use committee will make its recommendation at another meeting on September 22, and the planning commission will issue its final decision on September 24.

More information on the schedule can be found here.