5 thoughts on “Xcel Getting Desperate, Suing to Forcibly Keep Customers (Boulder) Who Rejected Them”

1. Today's centralized, regulated monopolies that have for decades enjoyed  investor-grade returns for bond-grade operations, and lay the noose of their bad decisions( *cough* NRG, Commanche 3) around ratepayers necks, are not long for this world.  All they have left is the judicial branch.  Thanks for the update, CP. 

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   1. Definitely, I've been following this stuff with a lot of interest. Will be interesting to see if this campaign picks up steam. Given how crazy Xcel went about it with just one city considering it, imagine what will happen if other cities picked it up? 

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      1. That's their biggest fear:  setting legal precedent.  It can not be overstated just how valuable the work being done in Boulder is to the (literally) global movement of decentralized power and renewable energy.  We didn't leave the Stone Age because we ran out of stones.  We won't stop burning fossil fuel because it's gone, either.  It will be because we've developed a better way to power a 21st-century economy.

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2. This seems like a very important struggle. Boulder is on the right track, IMHO.

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   1. They're doing a yoeman's job for the transition movement, and we (yes, urban and rural Colorado) owe them a debt of gratitude.  Xcel knows the Boulder scenario is precedent-setting, and not in a good way if you are a monopolisitic, profit-guaranteed animal like they are.

      I'll give credit where credit is due – after we drug them to the table kicking and screaming in 2004 post-Amendment 37, they were supportive of the increases (now 30%, second-most aggressive in the nation).  With that, we gave them a profit matrix where Colorado now provides a disproportionate amount of their company profits.  (we're smaller than Minnesota, yet provide more to their bottom line.). 

      Since then, they effectively killed our solar entrepreneurs across the state and tried to monopolize that sector.  We're drowning in solar resources and VoteSolar has a 1 gigawatt distributed solar plan for Colorado that should be at the top of the Governor's 'to do' list.  Xcel has recently tried to gut our energy efficiency programs; they could have been out front with us on transforming to a truly-21st-century Renewable Thermal Standard proposed by Gail Schwartz last session (2013).   Yet, they spin their solar ownership plan as 'Solar Done Right',  we have this billion-dollar noose called Commanche 3 (latest Pueblo coal plant we're all paying for to repair their corporate balance sheet post-NRG debacle) and towns like Sterling, Alamosa, Burlington and Fort Morgan, Xcel franchises surrounded by rural electrics, could establish exciting partnerships to connect local, rural resources to their trade centers.  We could have the first 100% renewable-fueled P-20 education system in the nation with their support.  But instead, they fight.  "Done Right" campaigns that are nothing but code for "we own it".  Suing Boulder after losing three times at the ballot box to citizens – the third time they were literally taken to the woodshed even after wildly outstpending 'the peasants'. 

      I wish we had a ballot initiativae this cycle for Energy Democracy….just imagine what we could accomplish if we unleashed the collective scientific, entrepreneurial and technology genius of the citizens of this state.  And yes, I tire of the narrative out of the capitol building, referring to 'energy' issues in the vacuum of 'it's only really energy if it died millions of years ago.'  Our form of energy will be here and driving our robust economy long, long after the present-day drillers have come and gone.

       

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