Published on 13 Jul 2021 on Zacks via Yahoo Finance

Dominion (D) and Berkshire End $1.3B Questar Pipelines Deal

Dominion Energy D and Berkshire Hathaway Inc.’s (BRK.A) unit Berkshire Hathaway Energy announced the termination of the Questar Pipelines deal between them. The companies have decided to terminate the agreement due to ongoing uncertainty associated with achieving clearance from the Federal Trade Commission under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Antitrust Improvements Act of 1976.This decision effective Jul 9, 2021 will have no impact on Dominion Energy’s financial guidance for 2021 and the company is commencing a competitive process for the sale of Questar Pipelines. Dominion will take a 364-day term loan to repay $1.3-billion transaction deposit made by Berkshire Hathaway Energy. Dominion will repay the loan from sales proceeds of Questar Pipelines to an alternative buyer by 2021-end.The cancellation of the deal will not impact Dominion’s strategy of portfolio realignment and the company is confident of selling these assets to an alternate buyer.

Portfolio Realignment

Dominion’s portfolio realignment strategy and focus on regulated assets are evident from its investments in regulated infrastructure and other clean assets whose outputs are sold under long-term purchase agreements. In the past two years, the company disposed off some of its merchant generation facilities and the electric retail energy marketing business to focus on core regulated operations.Over the next 15 years, the company aims to invest $72 billion to strengthen its infrastructure and add more clean power generation assets to its portfolio. The company is adding clean energy units to the generation portfolio and targets carbon neutrality by 2050.