Solar farm reduces utility expenses for low-income Grand Valley users

What started as a simple solar farm turned into a first-of-its-kind community solar program for low-income members of Grand Valley Power and a model for similar projects around the state and nation. After partnering with Grid Alternatives, a nonprofit group that develops photovoltaic systems for low-income households in numerous states, the Colorado Energy Office has completed a two-year partnership designed to show the benefits of community solar gardens for low-income families. The first of those demonstration solar projects, which is located off 29 Road near Interstate 70, has helped low-income people participate in similar solar projects without having to come up with the expensive upfront costs of installing their own panels. At a dedication ceremony celebrating the successful completion of the demonstration project, Grand Valley’s chief executive officer, Tom Walch, said it took a community to make it happen. “On one side you had a bunch of starry-eyed environmentalists who want to save the world, and then on the other hand, you had a bunch of Grand Junction farmers and co-op people who just want to save money,” Walch said. “We were able to work together. We planned this, we came up with the idea, we put the plan together. We worked together side by side.” Each family involved in the project — several rotate through the program in four-year intervals — save about $600 in electricity costs during that time. Originally, the rural cooperative just wanted to create a community solar program to help it meet its renewable energy requirement, which it did back in 2011. At a cost of about $77,500, the cooperative installed 88 panels, and leased them out to cooperative members, allowing them to have solar without having to pay their own installation costs. In 2015, the energy office awarded Grid a $1.2 million grant to partner with rural electric cooperatives and municipal utilities statewide to develop solar programs aimed at helping low-income users. Grid then worked with Grand Valley and geared its solar farm to serve those cooperative members who earn 80 percent or less of the median income of the Grand Valley. Since then, Grid has worked with several other utilities, including Delta-Montrose Electric Association, San Miguel Electric Association and Holy Cross Energy, which serves power users in Garfield County. Eventually, the partnership now serves more than 300 households in the state, supplying about 1.4 megawatts of electricity. As a result, the project earned national attention, said Kathleen Staks, executive director of the Colorado Energy Office, who attended Thursday’s event. “The two primary goals of this demonstration were to reduce electric costs for energy-burdened utility customers, and to demonstrate the scalability and viability of the low-income community solar model,” Staks said. “In collaboration with our utility partners, we have tested new approaches and created best practices that will guide future state and national expansion. We even have some international interest in this.”

Xcel Energy seeks to add 1.7GW of wind, solar in Colorado

Investor-owned utility Xcel Energy, backed by a coalition of 14 diverse consumer and energy groups, are asking the Colorado Public Utilities Commission to approve a proposal called the Colorado Energy Plan that they say could lead to $2.5 billion in clean energy investments in rural Colorado. Xcel Energy and the other groups — including the City of Boulder — are asking the PUC to approve a process that the company said would augment its portfolio of renewable resources and would not raise rates for Colorado electricity customers. The proposal, called a “stipulation,” would modify Xcel Energy’s current 2016 Electric Resource Plan. In addition to expanding renewable energy, it also calls for the possible early retirement of two coal-fired generating units in southern Colorado. In an Aug. 29 news release, Xcel Energy — the Minnesota-based parent of Public Service Company of Colorado — emphasized that the proposal would be advanced only “if the resulting portfolio of resources reduces, or at least does not increase, the cost of energy to Xcel Energy’s Colorado customers.” Xcel said it plans to issue a request for proposals soon that will target “a mix of utility and independent power producer owned facilities, with Xcel Energy having a targeted investment of 50 percent of the renewable generation, and 75 percent of the natural gas-fired, storage, or renewable with storage generation resources in the portfolio.” Up to 1,000 MW wind, 700 MW solar, 700 MW gas Portfolio estimates are up to 1,000 megawatts of wind, up to 700 megawatts of solar and up to 700 megawatts of natural gas and/or energy storage, Xcel Energy said. Parties to the stipulation include Xcel Energy’s subsidiary, Public Service Company of Colorado; the Colorado Public Utilities Commission staff; the Colorado Office of Consumer Counsel; the Colorado Energy Office; the City of Boulder; Climax Molybdenum Company; the Colorado Energy Consumers Group; the Colorado Independent Energy Association; the Colorado Solar Energy Industries Association, Interwest Energy Alliance; Invenergy LLC; Southwest Generation Operating Company, LLC; Rocky Mountain Environmental Labor Coalition and Colorado Building and Construction Trades Council, AFL-CIO (jointly, RMELC/CBCTC); Vote Solar; and Western Resource Advocates. Regulators’ approval sought by year’s end Parties to the stipulation are seeking approval of the proposal from the PUC by the end of this year. Among the major components of the Colorado Energy Plan are: ⦁ Retirement of 660 megawatts of two coal-fired generation units at the Comanche Generating Station, located in Pueblo, Colo., including Unit 1 by the end of 2022, and Unit 2 no later than the end of 2025. Unit 3 would remain in service. ⦁ Issuance of a competitively-bid, all-source request for proposal as part of Phase II of the 2016 Electric Resource Plan. The RFP could result in additions of up to 1,000 megawatts of wind, up to 700 megawatts of solar and up to 700 megawatts of natural gas and/or storage. No coal resource would be added as part of the RFP. Carbon emissions could be reduced by up to 60 percent by 2026, when compared to 2005 levels, under the proposal, Xcel said. ⦁ Utility ownership targets of 50 percent renewable generation resources and 75 percent of natural gas-fired, storage, or renewable-with-storage generation resources in the portfolio; ⦁ Reduction of the Renewable Energy Standard Adjustment, or RESA, bill rider to 1 percent, from the maximum 2 percent allowed, and currently being funded, under state law. The reduction of the RESA would be the subject of future regulatory proceedings and would not take effect until 2021 or 2022. ⦁ Accelerated depreciation for the early retirement of the two coal-fired units at Comanche, also to be addressed in future regulatory proceedings, and ⦁ Construction of a new switching station for a southern Colorado transmission “energy resource zone,” to help foster the further development of renewable generating resources in rural Colorado. Xcel Energy said on Aug. 29 that it planned to issue the all-source RFP “in the next several days” and would anticipate filing a recommended portfolio with the CPUC in the first quarter of 2018. A final decision on the recommended portfolio by the CPUC is expected in the summer of 2018, Xcel said.