All of us want reliable heat and electricity – but there is often a not-in-my-backyard resistence to hosting the power lines, compressors and relay stations that carry the energy. This tension will soon be playing out before the Colorado Public Utilities Commission.
When local governments block construction of needed energy infrastructure, state law lets utility companies appeal to the PUC. The problem is, utilities are abusing the statutes, turning the PUC into a kind of an über land-use board. State regulators shouldn’t second-guess local governments unless there’s a compelling need.
In San Miguel County, Tri-State Generation and Transmission wants to replace a small power line with a more intrusive, larger capacity structure, creating visual blight on one of southwest Colorado’s most stunning vistas. The county requires utility lines to be buried, and Tri-State quickly appealed to the PUC. Two years ago, the PUC told Tri-State to calculate how much it would have to pay for rights of way to settle a dispute about whether burying the line might be cheaper than putting it above ground. Tri-State never supplied the numbers. Later this month, the PUC likely will issue another order that may countermand its earlier decisions.
In retrospect, the PUC let itself get dragged into the dispute too early. The commission should have told Tri-State it wouldn’t act until the local process was finished. Yet the precedent of the state second-guessing local government was set.
Now Xcel Energy is jumping the gun on Boulder County’s land-use process regarding placement of a new natural gas compressor station. Xcel says it needs a larger compressor to pump more natural gas to growing communities in Grand and Summit counties. Last spring, Boulder County commissioners came close to approving Xcel’s plans to put a new compressor close to the old Marshall Road landfill near Superior, but the county said Xcel had to study other sites first. Xcel is working on a proposal that would let the county choose whether to put the new permanent compressor at Marshall Road or near an existing, smaller unit near Louisville.
To meet winter’s gas demands, though, Xcel also wants to install a temporary compressor near on its Louisville site. The county will take up the request next month, but Xcel already has appealed to the PUC.
Xcel says the filing is to speed up the process. But the move could pressure the county into doing as the company wants.
At best, the appeal was premature, so the PUC should reject it at its Aug. 24 meeting. Neither Boulder nor San Miguel counties outright blocked the utilities’ proposals; they just want the companies to comply with local laws.
While the state has an interest in ensuring that utilities can build facilities, the PUC shouldn’t undermine local government.
