Rappahannock Electric outlines plan to separate large data‑center loads from member rates

Rappahannock Electric Cooperative officials told the Madison County Board of Supervisors they are pursuing legal and rate changes intended to keep costs for residential and small‑business members separate from very large electricity customers such as hyperscale data centers.

The cooperative’s director of government affairs, Lindsay Watson, told the board REC is “growing, and I want to provide you with an update,” and described a two‑track strategy: create a wholly owned affiliate to buy power on the wholesale market for large customers and file a dedicated tariff to recover costs from those customers rather than from REC’s traditional membership.

Why it matters: REC serves parts of multiple Virginia counties that include Madison County. Board members pressed REC on how rapid data‑center growth could affect reliability and price for local customers. REC said separating large loads into a subsidiary and a dedicated…