Two weeks after Reston RELAC announced it will cease operations, Lake Anne residents who have relied on the cooling service for decades are still looking for clearer guidance on how to prepare for next summer.
After informing customers, the owners of the utility, known formally as the Reston Lake Anne Air Conditioning Corporation, sent a letter to Reston Association Chief Operating Officer Peter Lusk earlier this month stating that they “will no longer provide chilled water service,” co-owner Mark Waddell said in an Oct. 19 update.
The notice should open the door for RA to give residents “permission to install your own HVAC system,” according to Waddell.
However, RA has maintained that it will keep enforcing the provision of its deed prohibiting individual AC units in properties where the central AC system is available until it receives “formal notification” that RELAC will be shut down.
“At this time, properties subject to the covenant, without an approved medical exemption, will not be permitted to install exterior HVAC systems,” RA said on Oct. 16.
According to RA spokesperson Cara O’Donnell, the homeowners’ association received a letter from Waddell “indicating his desire to discontinue RELAC service,” but it’s looking for confirmation that RELAC will be dissolved under the State Corporation Commission (SCC) before considering it unavailable.
As of press time, Reston RELAC LLC remains listed as a regulated public utility by the SCC.
“We are awaiting word as to whether the entity will be dissolved or whether a new owner/operator will keep the system running next year,” O’Donnell said. “We are doing our due diligence and are continuing to collect details regarding RELAC service and whether it will truly end or whether another operator will step in, and we are working to find a solution for all members serviced by the RELAC system.”
RA has issued 101 medical exemptions to date allowing homes with residents with disabilities to have individual AC units. O’Donnell noted that not all of those properties have necessarily installed HVAC systems, as they must still submit applications for approval to the association’s Design Review Board.
It remains unclear, though, what residents who don’t have a qualifying disability can do to prepare for next summer, one resident lamented to FFXnow.
Waddell told FFXnow on Friday (Oct. 24) that he’s reached out to RA leaders “several times” and remains “mystified” by why they’re continuing to enforce the AC-unit ban when residents with medical exemptions have never been required to remove RELAC equipment in the past.
“We will no longer be providing service to the property line, so I don’t see why they’re trying to enforce this,” Waddell said. “Our business with the SCC should have nothing to do [with Reston Association’s deed].”
He added that he will take the necessary steps with the SCC to dissolve RELAC, but has to take care of bookkeeping, invoices and other administrative duties first.
Serving approximately 600 residential and 25 commercial properties, including the Lake Anne and Vantage Hill condominiums and the Waterview, Hickory, Washington Plaza, Wainwright, Coleson and Governors Square clusters, RELAC is a geothermal system that draws water from Lake Anne, chills it and circulates it to individual properties.
It was viewed at its launch in June 1965 as an “innovative” air conditioning system, Hunter Mill District Supervisor Walter Alcorn said in a newsletter last week, providing a quieter, communal alternative to the noisy, ozone-depleting units available at the time.
However, the aging system has required increased maintenance over the years, and some homeowners have argued that it’s no longer efficient, unsuccessfully petitioning in 2008 and 2015 to strike RA’s ban on individual AC units for clusters on the lot line.
RELAC’s owners then announced in December 2023 that they would no longer provide chilled water services, citing increased costs and challenges with getting customers to pay their bills. The following year, RA held another failed referendum to amend its deed, but local residents led by Simon McKeown established a nonprofit to take over operations in time for the 2024 cooling season.
The new nonprofit known as springRELAC intended to take ownership of the utility, eventually turning it into a co-op, but McKeown’s death last December put those plans on hold.
Though Waddell had hoped to transfer ownership to Innovative Mechanical Systems, a Maryland-based HVAC contractor, recurring mechanical issues resulted in a frustrating summer for residents, and RELAC’s owners announced on Oct. 9 that “rising operating costs, aging infrastructure, and a decline in participation” had rendered the utility no longer sustainable.
RA says it has been in contact with all cluster presidents and the Lake Anne and Vantage Hill condo associations, along with Fairfax County representatives to keep members up to date on available resources.
“Currently, the Board of Directors is exploring all options available to it, including, but not limited to those available under the law,” RA said in its Oct. 16 statement. “We understand our members affected by this news have questions and need to plan accordingly, and we are working diligently to advocate for our membership and come to a solution.”
