CEA Leads Coloradans in Challenging Xcel
The effort to decarbonize Colorado’s largest electricity supplier, Xcel Energy, advanced in Denver last month as Coloradans lined up to speak at the Colorado Public Utilities Commission hearing on Xcel’s 2016 Electric Resource Plan. Members of CEA led Coloradans from all walks of life in voicing their concerns about Colorado’s electricity future.
The hearing room at the Public Utilities Commission was overflowing as the people of Colorado addressed the three PUC Commissioners. They expressed a host of concerns about Xcel’s plan, and asked for more focus on the abundance of cost-effective renewable energy available in Colorado, in accordance with Colorado’s laws and regulations.
The PUC is a part of the Colorado Department of Regulatory Agencies, and is responsible for regulating many parts of our state’s utilities, transportation, and telecommunications.
Issues raised during the public testimony included the need to:
Consider climate change and the urgency of reducing carbon emissions
Increase the reliance on renewable energy in order to reduce both emissions and costs
Accelerate the adoption of storage technologies to support the integration of higher levels of renewable energy
Begin contingency planning in the event of future coal bankruptcies and potential coal supply constraints
Allow new, cleaner resources to replace energy generation from older, dirtier, more expensive fossil fuel resources
Citizen witnesses also discussed the need to analyze the choices between renewable energy (with no future fuel costs) and fossil fuel resources (with billions of dollars of future fuel costs) using lower discount rates. A lower discount rate will show increased savings from cost-effective renewable energy because future fuel costs won’t be so heavily discounted.
Discounting the approximately $60 billion in future fuel costs associated with Xcel’s Electric Resource Plan at Xcel’s Weighted Average Cost of Capital (“WACC”) will have the effect of shrinking these future fuel costs and also shrinking the savings that will come from cost-effective renewable energy resources like wind and solar that don’t have future fuel costs.
More details on Xcel’s Electric Resource Plan and the key issues, including the importance of the choice of discount rate, are available in the public comment filing made by Clean Energy Action Board member Leslie Glustrom.
CEA is grateful that the new appointees to the Colorado PUC , Chairperson Jeff Ackerman and Commissioner Wendy Moser, along with Commissioner Frances Koncilja, are dedicated to hearing from the public and that the public is well enough informed to provide useful and compelling testimony!
You can also check out Christi Turner’s comprehensive article in Boulder Weekly and learn more about this important step froward in the fight for cheaper, cleaner power.