Dive Brief:
- Xcel Energy on Thursday filed a $1.9 billion wildfire mitigation plan with the Colorado Public Utilities Commission that includes adding hundreds of weather stations near power lines, updating pole and equipment inspection schedules in high-risk areas, and expanding its vegetation management program.
- If the plan is approved, incremental bi-annual changes would increase a typical residential bill approximately 9.56%, or almost $9 per month, by 2028.
- Xcel has been named in almost 300 lawsuits in Colorado alleging its power lines helped spark the Marshall fire which started in 2021 and caused more than $2 billion in damages. Xcel’s Southwestern Public Service also faces lawsuits in connection with the Smokehouse Creek Fire in the Texas Panhandle this year.
Dive Insight:
Wildfire risk has increased since Xcel filed its first wildfire mitigation plan in 2020, the utility told Colorado regulators.
“Doing more to mitigate wildfire risk requires substantial investment,” the utility said in its application. “Three of the five largest fires in Colorado history occurred in just the last five years, and Colorado endured two of the most destructive fires in that same time period.”
Based on the utility’s updated risk mapping, “the geographic areas of moderate to high risk in the Company’s service and facilities footprint have nearly doubled since the 2020 WMP.”
Wildfires are a growing risk for utilities, particularly as extreme heat and drought increase, and are making it more difficult for them to procure liability insurance. In 2019, Pacific Gas & Electric filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy after fires caused by its powerlines burned hundreds of thousands of acres in Northern California and led to more than 100 deaths.
Xcel said its Colorado wildfire plan includes “a variety of new, expanded, and more targeted programs,” including a public safety power shutoff program to deactivate lines in times of high risk, and an enhanced powerline safety settings program that operates and re-energizes power lines in ways that reduce wildfire risks.
The plan includes using inspections to create 3D maps of equipment and terrain in high-threat areas and a multi-year program to identify and replace or upgrade equipment, underground some power lines, replace and repair poles, and rebuild transmission lines in high-risk areas.
“Our goal is to ensure that no catastrophic wildfire is started by Xcel Energy assets. And, while we’ve made significant wildfire safety progress in Colorado and achieved key goals, there is still work to be done to meet the evolving threat,” Bob Frenzel, president and CEO of Xcel, said in a statement.
The use of enhanced powerline safety settings will increase the number of feeders Xcel can set to “safety settings” remotely, sectionalizing lines in order to impact fewer customers when power is shut off, and adding equipment in high-risk areas and new technology to improve the program.
In its application, Xcel said its plan is similar to many of the measures being implemented in other utility wildfire mitigation programs in the Western U.S.
The proposed investments and approaches “create a comprehensive multilayered approach to wildfire risk reduction through increased awareness, system investments, operational activities, and customer engagement and resiliency measures designed to both prevent wildfire ignitions from utility infrastructure and limit the spread of fires regardless of their cause,” Xcel said.
