Boulder's 2B means Progress on Clean Energy

Boulder's 2B means Progress on Clean Energy
Anne B. Butterfield, October 25, 2010 (Huffington post)

In mountaineering there's a land feature known as a saddle -- a high ridge between two or more peaks from which a climber can study options for ascent or descent. The saddle is not a destination but rather a strategic place for planning. It's worth the energy spent in reaching, especially if the route or conditions are uncertain.

That's what Yes on 2B offers the City of Boulder. It allows Boulder to investigate real plans for its energy future and report back to voters in the next year or more. 2B is not an energy plan, but a mechanism to let the city have stable funding while being legally separate from Xcel Energy and its annual franchise fee amounting to about $4 million. 2B is therefore dubbed the "replacement tax."

Here is how two City Councilors put it in the Daily Camera:

“2B has the unanimous support of city council and its passage is critical. Simply put, if it fails the city will need to cut its General Fund budget by over $4 million per year. That will significantly reduce support for a wide variety of essential services, including police, human services, libraries, parks and recreation, and open space.”

To help clarify some misconceptions about Issue 2B, here is what it will not do:

- 2B will not affect Xcel`s provision of energy to Boulder customers in any way
- 2B will not change your relationship with Xcel as your energy provider
- 2B will not raise additional revenue for the city
- 2B is technically a new tax, but it will not cost you extra money
- 2B does not, in any way, imply support for replacing Xcel as the city`s energy provider
- 2B does not, in any way, affect your control, as a voter, over the ultimate decision about how Boulder will meet its future energy needs.

This "replacement of the franchise fee" could seem confusing, since a franchise fee itself is a strange creature. Why would any utility pay a city so much money rather than merely lower its utility bills? The tradition of franchise fees started as an inducement for the long term contract while giving the utility access to city property (like a lease). It was first paid out of the utility's earnings. Now utilities often collect and remit the fee directly from ratepayers. It's as if Xcel has morphed into being a taxing authority for the City, and this status will last to the end of this year when the franchise expires. 2B replaces that funding, allowing the city to provide familiar services with stable funding while exploring options for getting Boulder to a very high proportion of clean energy in the next several years.

There's no reason to assume that Boulder should hang tight with Xcel Energy and wait for its supposedly excellent plans for decarbonization to pay off -- for in fact many challenges have come against the coal plant retirement plan known as HB 1365 or the Clean Air-Clean Jobs Act. Xcel has recently stated that fulfilling its own proposal to retire up to 900 megawatts of coal capacity will risk reliability and unreasonable cost impacts on customers. The state's health department has stated that Xcel's plan cannot meet the air improvement requirements of law.

On top of that, this week, the Colorado Mining Association filed a motion to block two of three Public Utilities commissioners from ruling on the $1.3 billion plan to close several coal plants. The charge is that Chairman Ron Binz and Matt Baker are embroiled in conflict of interest having clearly negotiated with Xcel Energy on the framework for cost recovery for the utility's plan to replace coal capacity with natural gas turbines. "The Commissioners have breached their duty to the people of Colorado by making a private deal with Xcel Energy (PSCo) to allow it to 'spend itself rich,'" the motion alleges.
Xcel Energy defends its involvement by explaining that such negotiation is business as usual. But this time they're not saying it to powerless citizen intervenors, they're saying it to a major industry in the state.

So the legal challenge may devolve into a battle of the titans with limitless legal resources (Xcel's being paid for by ratepayers), and it could drag on.

Therefore it is truly fortuitous that Boulder's City Council chose not to renew its franchise agreement with Xcel, and can explore options for becoming a municipal utility or compelling Xcel to assist with legislative restraints and create for Boulder a unique business arrangement, such as it does with numerous major buyers in the state.

Boulder has the company of many communities that are breaking away from business as usual for their energy supply. Marin County in California fought its state's mega-utility, PG&E, to retain its right to form its own utility and now is the nation's first to derive 75 percent of its energy from renewable sources, with rates lower than those charged for natural gas. Winterpark, Florida, broke loose of its investor-owned utility through a five year process strongly supported by voters, resulting in higher reliability. Gainesville, Florida and Ontario, Canada have instituted guaranteed rates to buy renewable power, causing rapid installation at low rates.

These visions could be possible for Boulder, and they can be explored and vetted with no change in utility rates and no change in city services either, should 2B get passed by the voters. It's a good to get to a secure place where options can be thoroughly explored.

Vote yes on 2B.

Real Growing Pains and the Clean Air-Clean Jobs Act

Real Growing Pains and the Clean Air-Clean Jobs Act
October 13, 2010 (Huffington Post)

Colorado's Clean Air-Clean Jobs Act (HB 1365) is crafted to take Colorado past its coal intensive glory by ordering Xcel Energy (and Black Hills) to retire or retrofit a significant portion of their coal burning capacity and supplant it with natural gas. For Xcel, that means about 900 megawatts - all of Valmont's 186 MW in Boulder, and most of Cherokee in Denver. This law was passed to protect the state from top-down intervention expected from the US Environmental Protection Agency in compelling compliance with clean air standards.

And the Front Range needs to comply. To listen to doctors from National Jewish Health speak -- of the effect of ozone and particulates on the lungs of Front Range residents at the public hearing at the Public Utilities Commission on September 23 -- is to lose all doubt.

Through four and a half hours, roughly one hundred people gave sworn testimony that fell largely into two camps -- one on the costly health effects of the particulates and ozone-laced air, and the other camp spoke of the economic ruin that mining communities fearfully expect.

(Full disclosure: Yours truly testified of her history with mild asthma and lung surgery to correct a rare lung disorder needed while living close to the Valmont plant.)

A mom from Golden spoke with three children; she told of her youngest child's asthma, its impact on his life and hers, of the trips to medical appointments and other efforts.

Perhaps most jarring was a pediatrician citing a study on healthy children -- one group growing up in air laced with small particulates and ozone, and a second group living in clean air. The former group reportedly had five times more measurable lung damage than the latter. A doctor for Physicians for Social Responsibility described the smallness of airborne particulates enabling them to pass through the blood-brain barrier, contributing perhaps to a noted trend of lower IQs in children in the most polluted areas.

The commissioners also heard from railroad executives and truck drivers, hotel owners in Craig, a power plant operator and dozens of miners and their relatives opposing the plan to retire rather than retrofit coal plant capacity. The level of emotion for all but the executives was palpable. Most emphasized the many generations their families had lived in Colorado and how they adored their communities; many exclaimed the pristine air of northwest Colorado, thanks, reportedly, to top-notch scrubbers on their nearby large coal plant.

So much was said of the extraordinarily deep blue of the sky around Craig, one could not help but wonder about the solar energy potential.

It certainly seemed that the area, and the niceness of the people, must make a terrific destination for a weekend visit.

Along with the local pride was evidence of the coal community feeling downtrodden. One woman, near tears, showed the portraits of members of her family, sure that HB 1365 would dislocate them. One man introduced himself as "one of those dirty coal miners everyone's been talking about." Many seemed shaken by the seriousness of air quality issues, remarking how "no one wants bad air quality."

In preparation for the public hearings, the Commission posted an economic impact report on HB 1365 by the LEEDS School of Business, which some opponents criticized. However its predictions indicate that Colorado's coal country can prevail -- with assertions that two-thirds of coal produced in Colorado now is sold out of state, and the portion going to Valmont and Cherokee is only 7 percent. Net jobs in the coal industry would supposedly remain constant.

Colorado Conservation Voters paid for a public opinion poll on HB 1365 that was conducted by two polling firms, one Democratic and one Republican. It found that nearly 80 percent of voters prefer their power to be generated by natural gas and renewable resources instead of coal -- and are willing to pay for it, as reported by the Denver Business Journal.

The pain of the coal miners and their families was distressing to watch. As often as they spoke of rising demand for energy, some must have guessed their product would see no slump in demand if Cherokee and Valmont stopped burning coal. Indeed, Peabody Coal has been announcing its vision for greater salesthrough exports to China, with intent to get ports in the Northwest expanded. Maybe the large number of t-shirts emblazoned with "Clean Coal Technology - It Works" had something to do with the miners' selection of information.

Nonetheless, clean energy leaders in the Front Range should take a look at Colorado's coal mining areas, their beautiful natural resources, their labor market and community colleges, and the Workforce Investment Act's ability to help workers through transitions that we on the Front Range are all too willing to cause and profit by. Colorado's coal country also needs to profit in the New Energy Economy, instead of being so dominated by one industry.