Today, data centers are becoming larger and increasingly power hungry due to society’s rapid digitization and the rise of artificial intelligence (AI). The proliferation of digital devices and services is driving unprecedented demand for computation. This shift has positioned data centers as one of the leading contributors to load growth worldwide in the coming decades and will undoubtedly be a key contributor to Virginia’s expected 85% increase in power demand over the next 15 years.
The scale of this growth is staggering, and with the U.S. government increasingly pushing for AI leadership, it is only set to grow from here. With announcements of multi-gigawatt data centers appearing almost weekly in the news, energy demands are set to skyrocket. PJM Interconnection LLC estimates that the Dominion Energy zone will almost double its summer peak load in the next 15 years, from about 22 GW in 2023 to roughly 42 GW in 2038, as shown in PJM’s long-term load forecast report and Dominion Energy’s latest integrated resource plan.
Achieving this level of growth presents monumental challenges. Doubling the capacity of the grid in just 15 years requires massive investments in both generation capacity and transmission infrastructure. Compounding these challenges is the growing necessity to transition to cleaner energy sources, as mandated by state and corporate sustainability goals.
To address these hurdles, Dominion Energy recognized the need for smarter, more sustainable planning methods. With the stakes higher than ever, the utility set out on a path to modernize grid planning and ensure the reliable delivery of power in the face of explosive load growth.
Digital Transformation
As the energy industry evolves to meet the demands of a more interconnected and electrified world, Dominion Energy has been on a strategic digital transformation path to enhance operational efficiency, improve reliability and support its ambitious sustainability goals.
One of the early strategic technology initiatives identified was the need for a more precise and scalable approach to managing planned outages of the transmission network in the operational planning time horizon. As the capital project volume increased, the number of necessary outages also grew, creating greater complexity in maintaining reliability. Because the system must uphold N-1 security, outages cannot simply be scheduled at will — they must be carefully coordinated to prevent risks to grid reliability. However, the sheer number of outage permutations made it impossible to study them effectively using traditional methods. Without the ability to analyze these outages at scale, the complexities of scheduling often result in frequent rescheduling or delays, significantly driving up operation and maintenance (O&M) costs.
To address this need, Dominion Energy created a platform called Analysis on Demand (ANODE) that leverages large-scale modeling and simulation to provide an evergreen view of the entire outage schedule. This capability is especially critical when capital expenditures are high and the grid is operating with minimal margin, such as during periods of massive load growth. Through comprehensive outage analysis, ANODE helps to minimize O&M expenditures and maximize capital efficiency, enabling projects to be executed with improved reliability and predictability.
The success and extensibility of the ANODE platform laid the groundwork for further innovations. Building on its methodologies and insights, Dominion Energy’s strategic initiatives team tackled other critical challenges, such as long-term load integration planning. The team recognized the principles underlying ANODE — that is, operational planning data visualization, predictive analysis and scenario testing — could be applied to address the rapidly growing demand for power. This led to the development of tools like the Hosting Capacity Analysis platform, which provides a comprehensive view of the transmission grid’s ability to accommodate new loads and can also be adapted to evaluate generation.
A Better Way to Plan
Before this project began, analyzing the transmission grid’s ability to accommodate incremental load, often referred to as hosting capacity, was a labor-intensive and time-consuming process. Distribution-level hosting capacity, which has been a concept for years, is easier to evaluate because the system is connected radially. Transmission-level analysis is more complicated due to the networked nature of the system. Because the transmission system operates as a graph network rather than a radial one, changes in load growth or generation in one area can significantly impact capacity in other areas. There are also significantly more regulations placed on the planning and operations of the transmission network by the regulatory body, the North American Electric Reliability Corporation.
Because of this complexity, each study often required several weeks to manually run different data scenarios and compile results. As the demand for these studies increased, it became clear the existing process was unsustainable. The team recognized the need for a more efficient and scalable approach to keep pace with this growth. Automating these analyses quickly emerged as a critical first step.
The Dominion Energy team required a method to identify the optimal locations for these centers, considering cost, logistics and other factors. Since no out-of-the-box tools exist for this purpose and no standard methodology is available for such studies, an in-house standard for conducting hosting capacity analyses at the transmission level had to be developed. Additionally, a tool capable of performing these computationally intensive studies at scale was necessary.
Hosting Capacity Analysis
This vision led to the creation of Hosting Capacity Analysis, a tool codeveloped by Dominion Energy, Simple Thread and Right Analytics LLC. Building on Dominion Energy and Simple Thread’s successful collaboration on ANODE and other projects, the team combined expertise in power systems, user experience and software engineering to design a solution that is both user friendly and powerful. The result is a customized modeling and visualization tool that delivers insights into the evolving transmission capacity in Dominion Energy’s service area.
The team began by developing and rigorously vetting an analysis methodology to ensure it was the right approach. This critical first step was designed to confirm their proposed methods for tackling the challenge would perform effectively across the various scenarios under consideration. Establishing this foundation was essential for all subsequent work.
One of the key challenges was scaling a solution that was inherently geographical while also accounting for network topology as it iterated through N-1 and N-1-1 scenarios. The task required integrating multiple layers of data while maintaining a clear focus on the tool's core objectives. Simple Thread’s expertise proved invaluable, helping to transform a complex problem into a practical and effective solution.
Simple Thread collaborated closely with Dominion Energy’s and Right Analytics’ internal teams to evolve the prototype from a set of power systems analysis and data mapping scripts into a fully functional, production-ready tool that lowered the barrier to entry for someone looking to ask what-if questions. The result was a scalable, flexible and user-friendly platform that was visually intuitive and, most importantly, highly actionable for business development and planning purposes.
With the Hosting Capacity Analysis software now in place, team members can input all relevant variables into a scenario and quickly generate a detailed report outlining how that scenario would impact the available capacity on the transmission network. The tool identifies transmission bottlenecks by running contingency analyses under various conditions, allowing planners to pinpoint areas of the grid with sufficient capacity for new loads. Users can also configure new scenarios and execute studies based on custom assumptions, giving them the flexibility to adapt as conditions change.
The impact has been transformative. What once took weeks of effort can now be accomplished in just a few hours. If adjustments are needed, planners can modify inputs and rerun scenarios almost instantly, enabling faster decision-making and reducing downtime between iterations. This level of efficiency ensures discussions can move forward without the delays that previously hindered progress.
This analysis is crucial for Dominion Energy’s planning team as an infrastructure investment tool, but it is also critical for customers.
Whether it is load or supply, it all must be balanced and it all uses the same wires. The same transmission planning tool initially designed to evaluate grid capacity for new demand can also be adapted to study optimal connection points for new generation. As clean energy generation continues to grow, the potential benefits of using a unified tool for both demand and supply are challenging to quantify but easy to envision.
Although Dominion Energy does not currently leverage this functionality — since it falls under PJM’s responsibility — the tool could play a role in supporting aspects of FERC Order 2023, which in part seeks to accelerate the integration of clean energy.
Solution Highlights
The Hosting Capacity Analysis tool delivers transformative benefits:
- Utility providers, policymakers and business development have an easier time understanding the impact new development has on the grid.
- Scenario questions that previously took weeks to answer can now be answered in a matter of days or hours.
- Accessibility has increased with a larger number of employees being able to use the software.
By combining user experience expertise, engineering ingenuity and cutting-edge software, Dominion Energy, Simple Thread and Right Analytics have partnered to create a solution that is not just meeting today’s challenges but also laying the groundwork for a smarter future in Virginia and beyond.
As an important footnote, Dominion Energy, Simple Thread and Right Analytics submitted the project for the American-Made Digitizing Utilities Prize from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Electricity and won both rounds. The award recognizes innovative tools and data analytics to address the vast amounts of data on the grid, while accelerating electrification and renewable energy integration.
Acknowledgments
The project team included Katelynn Vance, Amirreza Sahami, Nathan Rice, Andrea Pinceti and Kevin Jones from Dominion Energy; Nick Agliano, David Leyden and Spencer Hansen from Simple Thread; and Saman Babei and Hanif Livani from Right Analytics.
