The proposed Cumberland Energy Center would be a three gigawatt methane gas fired power plant developed by Dominion Energy along the banks of the James River in Cumberland County, immediately east of the Buckingham County line. The proposed site sits only two and a half miles down the River from the existing gas fired Bear Garden Generating Station. However, the proposed plant would be five times the size of Bear Garden, making it the second largest gas plant in the US.
The Cumberland plant would bring unprecedented levels of air, water, noise, and light pollution to Northeastern Buckingham County. Generations of residents in this area have been affected by environmental issues caused by Bear Garden, the Colonial Pipeline tank facility across the road from the proposed site, the Cobbs Creek Reservoir, and the former coal station and existing coal ash dump at Bremo. Furthermore, this area is threatened by new proposals for solar developments, data center developments at Bremo, and Valley Link transmission lines. The proposed facility opens the door for new development that is incompatible with rural Virginia, and it will require larger transmission lines and new gas pipelines to operate. Dominion has not announced details about the new infrastructure that is required for this proposed plant.
Dominion Energy touts the economic benefits of the proposed plant. However, as we have seen with Bear Garden, these positive impacts are overblown. Dominion has revised down the number of people directly employed at the proposed plant, and they continue to cite numbers for “direct and indirect” economic benefits calculated with a proprietary methodology. Most importantly, tax revenues paid to Cumberland County by Dominion will decrease every year as the plant depreciates. Tax revenues will be temporary, even as Dominion’s profits, and electricity rates charged to ratepayers, increase every year.
Meanwhile, the harm caused to our rural community would be permanent:
Air pollution: Methane gas combustion emits hundreds of air pollutants, including NOx and PM2.5 which are tied to respiratory illness, cancer, heart disease, and brain damage. The power plant would create a plume of pollution that requires 300’ tall smoke stacks.
Water use: Dominion has said that the plant would use up to 2 million gallons of water per day, with an average daily water use of 800,000 gallons, or about the same amount of daily water use as a community of 10,000 residents like Cumberland County. Dominion has not announced where it will get water or discharge wastewater, and impacts on local wells and the James River remain unknown.
Noise: Dominion has said that the plant will create 75 decibels of round-the-clock hum. This level of noise will transform the soundscape to make the James River sound like an urban freeway. Noise from the plant will carry for miles across the landscape and disturb humans and wildlife alike.
Light: The plant would be a major industrial use that requires always-on lighting to blanket over 150 acres of land. This kind of artificial lighting obscures the night sky, is visible for miles especially under cloudy or misty conditions, affects human sleep cycles, harms the circadian rhythms of wildlife, and alters the rural character of the landscape.
Dominion Energy announced this proposal in April 2026 and is attempting to rush through Cumberland’s Conditional Use Permit Process in the summer of 2026. Ahead of the public process, Dominion worked with the Chair of Cumberland County’s Board of Supervisors, who is a former Dominion Energy executive, to get County staff to sign non-disclosure agreements. Dominion is trying to smash Rural Virginia and grab as much infrastructure as they can, so that they can continue profiting off of data centers. We need to protect Buckingham County, and we start by getting more time to fully understand this proposal and the true extent of Dominion’s plans.