DOMINION ENERGY INC
For the period ended Dec 31, 2024. Filed Feb 27, 2025.
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FY2024 · Filed Feb 27, 2025
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Report of Independent Registered Public Accounting Firm
To the Shareholders and the Board of Directors of Dominion Energy, Inc.
Opinion on the Consolidated Financial Statements
We have audited the accompanying consolidated balance sheets of Dominion Energy, Inc. and subsidiaries ("Dominion Energy") at December 31, 2024 and 2023, the related consolidated statements of income, comprehensive income, equity, and cash flows, for each of the three years in the period ended December 31, 2024, and the related notes (collectively referred to as the "consolidated financial statements"). In our opinion, the consolidated financial statements present fairly, in all material respects, the financial position of Dominion Energy at December 31, 2024 and 2023, and the results of its operations and its cash flows for each of the three years in the period ended December 31, 2024, in conformity with accounting principles generally accepted in the United States of America.
We have also audited, in accordance with the standards of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (United States) (PCAOB), Dominion Energy’s internal control over financial reporting at December 31, 2024, based on criteria established in Internal Control — Integrated Framework (2013)issued by the Committee of Sponsoring Organizations of the Treadway Commission and our report dated February 27, 2025, expressed an unqualified opinion on Dominion Energy’s internal control over financial reporting.
Change in Accounting Principle
As discussed in Note 2 to the consolidated financial statements, Dominion Energy has elected to change its method of accounting for the recognition of actuarial gains and losses on its defined benefit pension and other postretirement benefit plans into earnings from an amortization approach to immediate recognition, which has been retrospectively applied in the consolidated financial statements at December 31, 2024 and 2023 and for the three years ended December 31, 2024.
These consolidated financial statements are the responsibility of Dominion Energy’s management. Our responsibility is to express an opinion on Dominion Energy’s consolidated financial statements based on our audits. We are a public accounting firm registered with the PCAOB and are required to be independent with respect to Dominion Energy in accordance with the U.S. federal securities laws and the applicable rules and regulations of the Securities and Exchange Commission and the PCAOB.
We conducted our audits in accordance with the standards of the PCAOB. Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain reasonable assurance about whether the consolidated financial statements are free of material misstatement, whether due to error or fraud. Our audits included performing procedures to assess the risks of material misstatement of the consolidated financial statements, whether due to error or fraud, and performing procedures that respond to those risks. Such procedures included examining, on a test basis, evidence regarding the amounts and disclosures in the consolidated financial statements. Our audits also included evaluating the accounting principles used and significant estimates made by management, as well as evaluating the overall presentation of the consolidated financial statements. We believe that our audits provide a reasonable basis for our opinion.
Critical Audit Matters
The critical audit matters communicated below are matters arising from the current-period audit of the financial statements that were communicated or required to be communicated to the audit committee and that (1) relate to accounts or disclosures that are material to the financial statements and (2) involved our especially challenging, subjective, or complex judgments. The communication of critical audit matters does not alter in any way our opinion on the financial statements, taken as a whole, and we are not, by communicating the critical audit matters below, providing separate opinions on the critical audit matters or on the accounts or disclosures to which they relate.
Regulatory Assets and Liabilities - Impact of Rate Regulation on the Consolidated Financial Statements — Refer to Notes 2, 12 and 13 to the Consolidated Financial Statements
Dominion Energy, through its regulated electric and gas subsidiaries, is subject to rate regulation by certain state public utility commissions and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (“FERC”) (collectively, the “relevant commissions”) which have jurisdiction with respect to the rates of electric utility companies. Management has determined its rate-regulated subsidiaries meet the requirements under accounting principles generally accepted in the United States of America to apply the specialized rules to account for the effects of cost-based rate regulation. Accounting for the economics of rate regulation impacts multiple financial statement line items and disclosures, such as property, plant and equipment, net; regulatory assets; regulatory liabilities; operating revenues; electric fuel and other energy-related purchases; purchased gas; other operations and maintenance expense; depreciation and amortization expense; and impairment of assets and other charges, collectively, the “financial statement impacts of rate regulation.”
Revenue provided by Dominion Energy’s electric transmission, distribution and generation operations and its gas distribution operations is primarily based on rates approved by the relevant commissions. Further, Virginia Electric and Power Company’s (“Virginia Power”) retail base rates, terms and conditions for generation and distribution services to customers in Virginia are reviewed by the Virginia State Corporation Commission (the “Virginia Commission”) in a proceeding that involves the determination of Virginia Power’s actual earned return on equity (“ROE”) during a historic test period, and determination of Virginia Power’s authorized ROE prospectively. Under certain circumstances, Virginia Power may be required to credit a portion of its earnings to customers.
When it is probable that regulators will permit the recovery of current costs through future rates charged to customers, these costs that otherwise would be expensed by nonregulated companies are deferred as regulatory assets. Likewise, regulatory liabilities are recognized when it is probable that regulators will require customer refunds or other benefits through future rates or when revenue is collected from customers for expenditures that have yet to be incurred. In addition, a loss is recognized if it becomes probable that capital expenditures will be disallowed for ratemaking purposes and if a reasonable estimate of the amount of the disallowance can be made. Dominion Energy evaluates whether recovery of its regulatory assets through future rates is probable as well as whether a regulatory liability due to customers is probable and makes various assumptions in its analyses. These analyses are generally based on orders issued by regulatory commissions, legislation and judicial actions; past experience; discussions with applicable regulatory authorities and legal counsel; estimated construction costs; forecasted earnings; and considerations around the likelihood of impacts from events such as unusual weather conditions, extreme weather events and other natural disasters, and unplanned outages of facilities.
We identified the impact of rate regulation as a critical audit matter due to the significant judgments made by management to support its assertions about the financial statement impacts of rate regulation. Management judgments include assessing the likelihood of (1) recovery of its regulatory assets through future rates and (2) whether a regulatory liability is due to customers. Given management’s accounting judgments are based on assumptions about the outcome of future decisions by the relevant commissions, auditing these judgments required specialized knowledge of the accounting for rate regulation and the rate setting process due to its inherent complexities.
Our audit procedures related to the assessment of whether recovery of regulatory assets through future rates or a regulatory liability due to customers is probable included the following, among others:
We tested the effectiveness of management’s controls over the evaluation of the likelihood of (1) recovery of regulatory assets through future rates, and (2) whether a regulatory liability is due to customers. We also tested the effectiveness of management’s controls over the initial recognition of amounts as regulatory assets or liabilities; and the monitoring and evaluation of regulatory and legislative developments that may impact the assessment of whether recovery of regulatory assets through future rates or a regulatory liability due to customers is probable.
We evaluated Dominion Energy’s disclosures related to the financial statement impacts of rate regulation.
We read and evaluated orders issued by the relevant commissions, as well as relevant regulatory statutes, interpretations, procedural memorandums, existing laws and other publicly available information to assess whether this external information was properly considered by management in concluding upon the financial statement impacts of rate regulation.
We considered the likelihood of (1) recovery of regulatory assets through future rates and (2) whether a regulatory liability is due to customers based on precedents established by the relevant commissions’ previous orders and Dominion Energy’s past experience with the relevant commissions.
For regulatory matters in process, we inspected associated documents and testimony filed with the relevant commissions for any evidence that might contradict management’s assertions.
We read and analyzed the minutes of the Boards of Directors of Dominion Energy and Dominion Energy’s rate-regulated subsidiaries for discussions of changes in legal, regulatory, or business factors which could impact management’s conclusions with respect to the financial statement impacts of rate regulation.
Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind (“CVOW”) Commercial Project – Estimated Total Project Cost – Refer to Note 10 to the Consolidated Financial Statements
As discussed in Note 10, Virginia Power’s CVOW Commercial Project is expected to be placed in service by the end of 2026 with an estimated total project cost of approximately $10.7 billion, excluding financing costs. The expected total project cost reflects increases driven primarily by projections for onshore electrical interconnection costs and network upgrade costs assigned by PJM.
Relative to Virginia Power’s previous cost estimate, the updated estimated total project cost reflects an approximately $0.6 billion increase for such onshore costs and network upgrade costs assigned to the project by PJM and an approximately $0.3 billion increase for increased contingency for remaining construction activities and other factors.
Virginia Power is subject to a cost sharing mechanism in which Virginia Power will be eligible to recover 50% of such incremental costs which fall between $10.3 billion and $11.3 billion with no recovery of such incremental costs which fall between $11.3 billion and $13.7 billion. There is no cost sharing mechanism for any total construction costs in excess of $13.7 billion, the recovery of which would be determined in a future Virginia Commission proceeding. In October 2024, Virginia Power closed on the sale of a 50% noncontrolling interest in the CVOW Commercial Project to Stonepeak Partners, LLC (Stonepeak) pursuant to which Stonepeak will contribute 50% of the remaining capital necessary to fund construction of the CVOW Commercial Project provided the total project cost, excluding financing costs, is less than $11.3 billion.
As a result of the revised total project cost estimate and cost sharing mechanism, in the fourth quarter of 2024 Virginia Power recorded a charge for costs not expected to be recovered from customers of $206 million within impairment of assets and other charges, which includes $103 million attributable to noncontrolling interests, and an associated income tax benefit of $26 million, in Dominion Energy’s Consolidated Statements of Income.
We identified the auditing of management’s anticipated allocated network upgrade costs and project contingency cost components of the revised total project cost estimate as a critical audit matter because of the judgments management made to determine those components of the expected total project cost. This required a high degree of auditor judgment and subjectivity, and a significant extent of effort, including the need to involve our construction specialists.
Our audit procedures related to the reasonableness of the anticipated allocated network upgrade costs and total project contingency components included the following, among others:
We tested the effectiveness of internal controls over management’s calculation of estimated total project costs, including those over the determination of anticipated allocated network upgrade costs and the estimate of total project contingency.
We evaluated management’s ability to accurately forecast contingency by performing a retrospective review of the project’s historical contingency utilization, reviewing internal communications relevant to the project, reading public information included in press releases and regulatory filings.
With the assistance of our construction specialists, we evaluated the reasonableness of the (1) contingency methodology (2) percentage complete of certain significant project components and (3) overall contingency percentage.
We obtained an understanding of management’s cost model for the network upgrade costs. We audited key inputs to the model and associated allocated cost estimate as it relates to the network upgrade costs, including generator participation and other expected transmission projects. We selected a sample of project costs associated with the network upgrade cost and compared our selections to realized costs of comparable historical projects.
/s/ Deloitte & Touche LLP
We have served as Dominion Energy’s auditor since 1988.
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