Public Service Company

Xcel Energy Thursday filed for state approval of a settlement with consumer groups in its ongoing rate case before the Colorado Public Utilities Commission (PUC), knocking nearly $44 million from its rate-increase request.
In a settlement with Energy Outreach Colorado and the Colorado Energy Consumers, Xcel agreed to only seek an annual electric rate increase of [...]

With Xcel Energy on pace to disconnect power to some 70,000 Coloradans this year for nonpayment, energy activists are openly questioning why ratepayers should pick up the tab for lavish executive board-member dinners, hotel and spa retreats and luxury box tickets to professional sports games.

The Governor’s Energy Office has an ambitious goal of expediting the addition of another 1,000 megawatts of renewable energy generation to Colorado’s electricity grid in the next few years, but the single biggest hurdle may be adding the necessary transmission lines.

Representatives of companies building utility-scale renewable projects like the 8-megawatt SunEdison solar plant in Colorado’s San Luis Valley say sun and wind generation facilities can be permitted and built in under two years, but transmission lines can take more than a decade to become reality.