Dive Brief:

• Rooftop solar in Colorado is lowering Xcel Energy's electric sales by about 0.2%, company officials said during an earnings conference call with analysts. It's not a major amount yet, but it could grow, officials said.
• Meanwhile, Xcel plans to spend $4.5 billion over the next five years on transmission.
• The company expects to form a “transco” to develop Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) regulated transmission projects. The company is still working out the details of the planned subsidiary.

Dive Insight:

Here's what Ben Fowke, Xcel's president and CEO, said on the net metering debate, which is getting underway in earnest in Colorado.

“The issue with net metering is getting the rules right, so that the policy is sustainable for the long run,” Fowke said. “Today, it's not all that noticeable. But if the aspirations of the rooftop solar industry are met, it would be extremely noticeable to customers that don't have a rooftop. And so that's what the whole industry is rallying around and understanding that we have to get the right rules in place so that the technology can compete on an equal basis and not disadvantage one customer for the benefit of another.”

And here's what Fowke said about FERC's return on equity (ROE) rates, which are higher than state regulators approved for in-state transmission projects. “I think you'll see some gap closure between a FERC ROE and what a typical state ROE is,” he said. “But hopefully, not too much, because I think there's – ROEs, hopefully, will improve at the state level. So hopefully, maybe FERC goes down a little bit and the state goes up.”