I couldn’t help but think about the heavily-leveraged municipal power plants here in North Carolina when reading about the City of Boulder’s vote to break free from the local private power provider in order to create a municipal power provider.
Actually, there were two issues on the ballot —one to break free from Xcel Energy and another to pay for it. Both passed by slim margins.
Bottom line is this is going to cost taxpayers a boatload of money, though no one is really sure just how much. Funny, Xcel Energy says its infrastructure is worth more than the city thinks it is.
NYT wrote up the issue in Sunday’s edition:
Leaders of the effort concede that huge challenges await if the city goes forward, and that Xcel is not the worst provider to have. Partly prodded by a Colorado law requiring 30 percent renewable energy by 2020 — one of the most aggressive standards in the nation — the company has become a big producer of wind electricity. It has also spent more than $40 million here in Boulder building a pilot project called Smart Grid, with sophisticated metering that can help customers reduce electricity use.
Not enough, some say.
“Boulder can do better,” said Shaun McGrath, a former mayor and a leader of the ballot drive.
…“It’s probably going to get passed because it is such a Boulder thing,” said Jane Imber, 55.
….And how green is green, anyway? Under Colorado law, shareholder-owned companies like Xcel are covered by the 30 percent renewable energy mandate by 2020. Municipally owned utilities of the size that Boulder would require would have to get to only 10 percent by then.
File this under ‘be careful what you wish for….’
