The lowest price reported in the Denver area was $4.29 in Littleton in the morning.

“But even that station’s likely to go up here soon,” said Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy, an app that helps drivers find the cheapest gas.

The highest price for gas on Monday in Colorado was $5.39 in Carbondale, De Haan said.

The Memorial Day weekend could add to the increases, according to GasBuddy.

De Haan attributed the string of $4.99 prices across the metro area to a tendency to follow the leader, both when prices go up and start dropping again.

The search for the best deals has gotten more challenging since the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran started Feb. 28. Oil prices began surging and exceeding $100 a barrel when Iran blocked the Strait of Hormuz. About 20% of the world’s global oil supply flows through the strait.

Oil prices have increased as fighting and threats of more strikes have intensified and have dropped when negotiations and proposed agreements are announced.

“Oil markets don’t like turmoil, and turmoil raises risk,” said De Haan.

A recent temporary shutdown caused by a power outage at the Suncor Energy oil refinery in Commerce City also helped nudge up prices, De Haan said. Suncor is the only refinery in Colorado.

The lowest gas price on Sunday in the Denver area was $4.05 per gallon and the most expensive was $4.99, according to GasBuddy. The lowest price in the state was $3.99 a gallon while the highest was $6.29.

While steep, De Haan said $6.29 is about $2 below the highest prices in the country.

Average gasoline prices in Denver have risen 35.3 cents a gallon in the last week, according to GasBuddy’s survey of 844 stations. Prices in Denver are 80.6 cents higher than a month ago and $1.59 a gallon higher than a year ago, GasBuddy said.

Colorado AAA said the average price for a gallon of regular unleaded gas in the state is $4.66, spokesman Skyler McKinley said.

“It is climbing. I anticipate tomorrow we’ll see a pretty steady jump up” ahead of the Memorial Day weekend, McKinley said.

McKinley recommended that people worried about gas prices should fill up before they head to the mountains.

“If you’re headed out for Memorial Day, you’re always going to find the best prices, the most competitive prices on the Front Range where there’s a ton of competition,” he said.

McKinley said drivers should avoid filling up on Interstate 70 or U.S. 285 if they can. “You’ll generally find cheaper prices at service stations that aren’t immediately adjacent to the highway.”

Asked about concerns over price-gouging, McKinley said, “Anyone who thinks that price-gouging is going on should walk into a convenience store at a gas station and ask how the margins work. Gas is a low-margin item.”

The Colorado Better Business Bureau said in an email that it has received only a handful of customer reviews and complaints about gas stations, but not necessarily regarding gas prices.

Oil companies have reported higher profits since the Iran war started. British oil giant BP said it more than doubled its profits in the first three months of this year over last year, TotalEnergies, based in Paris, raised its dividends and doubled its share buybacks after announcing $5.4 billion in net profits for the first quarter.

Suncor issued a community notification at 1:06 p.m. to report “increased smoke and flaring may be visible at Commerce City operations.” The notification said no emergency action was necessary and that toxic fumes were not detected by the refinery’s air monitoring network. People who live and work should not have experienced acute health problems, the company said in a statement.

The power outage happened after an Xcel Energy transmission line tripped, Lisa Anderson, an Xcel spokeswoman, said.

Xcel crews patrolled the line and did not find any faults and then alerted Suncor that employees could safely restart operations, Anderson said. Transmission lines can trip offline for a variety of reasons such as weather or equipment issues and those trips automatically shut off power to help keep people and the grid safe, she said.

No broader customer outages were reported.

Suncor officials reported the malfunction to the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment’s Air Pollution Control Division and state regulators sent an inspector to the facility, said Kate Malloy, a CDPHE spokeswoman.

The air division’s meteorologists believe Monday’s wind conditions lifted the pollution away from the ground, Malloy said. But the state will continue monitoring the malfunction and will learn more as Suncor files its mandatory reports about the outage.

officials said the increased flaring would happen while workers restarted the equipment that had been shut down after the power outage.

Monday’s outage and ensuing smoke caused alarm throughout Commerce City.

Multiple people in Commerce City sent pictures and videos to The Denver Post that showed black and yellow plumes flowing from the refinery’s smokestacks. Flames were visible from multiple stacks.

Cultivando, a public health advocacy group in Adams County, criticized the emergency notification system for providing few details about what was happening even as smoke poured into the air.

Steve O’Dorisio, an Adams County commissioner who lives near the refinery, said he was taking pictures and videos of the black smoke and yellow plume when workers, who were not affiliated with Suncor, stopped to caution him about potential dangers associated with the fumes.

O’Dorisio has demanded for years more accountability for Suncor and its repeated air pollution violations. He said Monday’s billowing smoke was just one more example of failures to keep Suncor from exceeding its permitted levels of pollution, and he demanded that Suncor officials meet with Commerce City residents to explain why it continues to happen.

“You can say it’s an error, a mistake, an accident,” he said. “You know what also isn’t good? To say this is routine.”

On April 14, black smoke billowed from the Suncor refinery in Commerce City as the facility shut down one of its plants due to an electrical issue. Gusts of black smoke were visible for miles, and the incident led CDPHE to send an inspector to the site.

The company later filed a malfunction report with the state health department that listed multiple pollutants it released in excess of the amounts allowed in its air pollution permit. Those pollutants included carbon monoxide and hydrogen sulfide, which also created more sulfur dioxide,

Flares at the refinery are used to burn off excess, combustible chemicals as a safety measure. The company is allowed to release visible smoke up to six minutes per hour, under the terms of its air permit.

Gusts of smoke from the Plant 2 main flare were visible for miles, leading the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment to send an inspector to the site and the company to issue one of its public notifications about refinery activity.

On Wednesday, Suncor filed a malfunction report with the state health department that listed the pollutants that it released in excess of the allowable amounts in its air-pollution permit. The company also said the malfunction was ongoing, and that it continued to release higher levels of carbon monoxide and hydrogen sulfide, which also created more sulfur dioxide, according to the report.

The company also exceeded the amount of black smoke that it is allowed to spew into the sky, according to the report. The company’s Title V air permit limits visible smoke to six minutes per hour.

Kate Malloy, a spokeswoman for the state Air Pollution Control Division, said strong winds on Tuesday and Wednesday pushed the pollutants higher into the air and lessened the amount that people on the ground near the refinery would breathe.

Suncor informed on Tuesday the state’s Air Pollution Control Division of the problem and reported that the smoke potentially violated the terms of the company’s air-pollution permit, Malloy said.

The company also reported that it may have released too much carbon monoxide from its Plant 2 fluidized catalytic cracking unit, one of the main pieces of equipment used to convert crude oil into gasoline, she said.

Air-quality monitors around the refinery did not record elevated amounts of sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide or particulate matter, Malloy said. Other toxics such as benzene, toluene, ethylene oxide and xylene also were below federal health standards.

However, ambient air concentrations at those monitors are different from flare emissions, which are released at higher altitudes than the monitors, which are placed along the borders of the Suncor property.

“We will continue monitoring the situation and air pollution levels in the area,” Malloy said.

Suncor did not respond to an email inquiry from The Denver Post.

The company’s notification, sent via email and phone calls to people who have subscribed to alerts, said increased smoke from the flare may be visible for several days as the plant undergoes maintenance that requires workers to shut down and restart equipment.

The refinery’s Plants 1 and 3 are also down for planned maintenance, Malloy said.

The refinery uses flaring to burn off excess gases to manage pressure within the equipment. When flaring occurs, passersby can see flames coming from smokestacks. However, black smoke is unusual.

“Flaring is a standard safety practice that allows for the controlled burning of process gases to safely manage pressure,” Suncor’s notification said. “We continuously monitor the air around our operations and provide air quality data and information with our neighbors and the public through near real-time community and fenceline monitoring systems.”

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday announced it would hear the companies’ arguments that such lawsuits should be heard in federal court, not state court. The companies — Suncor Energy and ExxonMobil — have argued that the case should be heard in federal court and are challenging a May decision by the Colorado Supreme Court that allowed the 2018 case filed by the City of Boulder and Boulder County to continue in state court.

“The oil companies have tried every avenue to delay our climate accountability case or move it to an out-of-state court system,” Boulder County Commissioner Ashley Stolzmann said in a news release Monday morning. “As everyone continues to face rising costs that put budgets under pressure, we must hold oil companies accountable for the significant harm they’ve caused our communities. We move forward with renewed energy and purpose for the next step toward justice.”

The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision on the Boulder case could have implications for dozens of similar lawsuits alleging that oil and gas companies knowingly lied to the public about how their production of fossil fuels contributes to climate change.

Governments around the country have sought damages totaling billions of dollars, arguing it����ap necessary to help pay for rebuilding after wildfires and severe storms worsened by climate change, along with rising sea levels.

State courts’ responses have been mixed. Some decided the cases should be heard in federal court, while Colorado and others allowed lawsuits to proceed in state court. While five of the seven Colorado Supreme Court justices said the case could stay in state court, the two dissenting justices called on the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene.

“As our filings make clear, climate policy shouldn’t be set through fragmented state‑court actions, and we look forward to making that case before the Court,” ExxonMobil spokesman Curtis Smith said in an emailed statement.

The Supreme Court’s decision in the Boulder case will resolve the conflicting court decisions, said Phil Goldberg, special counsel for the . The project is an effort by the National Association of Manufacturers to rebuff lawsuits in state courts that target industry.

The association is not a party to the Boulder case but to hear it.

“The Supreme Court����ap decision to review Boulder’s climate lawsuit is a decisive step toward resolving conflicting rulings nationwide and reaffirming that climate policy belongs with elected policymakers — not the courts,” Goldberg said in a statement. “Courts across the country have responded to these cases in divergent ways, with many dismissing them for lack of legal and practical foundation.

“Supreme Court review will bring much-needed clarity and uniformity to this issue and help ensure that fundamental policy decisions about energy and climate are made by the appropriate branches of government.”

Arguments on the case are expected in the fall.

In the Boulder case, ExxonMobil and Suncor argued emissions were a national issue that should be heard in federal court, where similar suits have been tossed out. The federal government has the power to regulate greenhouse gas emissions, not state governments, the companies previously argued.

Suncor did not respond to a request for comment Monday.

President Donald Trump’s administration weighed in to support the companies and urged the justices to reverse the Colorado Supreme Court decision, saying it would mean “every locality in the country could sue essentially anyone in the world for contributing to global climate change.”

Boulder officials want Suncor and ExxonMobil to pay for the impacts of climate change, including millions for recovery from extreme weather.

Boulder’s climate initiatives director, Jonathan Koehn, from Boulder city and county officials that the case “is, fundamentally, about fairness.”

“Boulder is already experiencing the effects of a rapidly warming climate, and the financial burden of adaptation should not fall solely on local taxpayers,” Koehn said. “We are hopeful that the Supreme Court will not hamstring our right under Colorado law to seek the resources needed to build a safer, more resilient future.”

The City of Boulder has prioritized climate adaptability in its long-term planning, with the effects of climate change directly influencing approaches to pertinent city issues such as transportation and wildfire hardening.

City and county officials said Boulder — and the rest of Colorado — was already shouldering costs from rising temperatures “that would otherwise fall on local taxpayers.”

“The lawsuit aims to ensure that the corporations that caused the harm pay their fair share, rather than shifting the burden to Colorado communities,” officials said in the release.

Tiff Boyd, the executive director for the Boulder County organization Classrooms for Climate Action, echoed Koehn’s belief that the average person has been bearing too much of the brunt of climate change. The 2021 Marshall fire’s impact is indicative of that — not just from the blaze but also from its aftermath of rebuilding and preparing for a future fire.

“The financial burden of all this adaptation is falling solely on local taxpayers,” said Boyd, who pointed toward an overwhelming scientific consensus that climate change is human-caused, particularly from the burning of fossil fuels.

Jonathan Skinner-Thompson, an associate law professor at the University of Colorado Boulder who specializes in administrative and environmental law, said the Supreme Court hasn’t shown interest in cases similar to the Boulder lawsuit in the past.

That, he said, raises curiosity and nerves about why the justices wanted to hear the case.

“You could read into that that maybe this Supreme Court doesn’t think it has the authority to hear these types of lawsuits, and so that would block people from bringing them in the future,” Skinner-Thompson said.

Monday’s decision to take up the case comes on the heels of the Environmental Protection Agency’s recent revocation of a finding that climate change posed a threat to public health, which provided the legal underpinning for regulating greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act.

How the Supreme Court handles challenges to that decision may offer a window into the justices’ views on the Boulder case, he said.

“I think that����ap going to be a big issue in terms of how that impacts what the Supreme Court thinks about these types of climate nuisance cases, going forward,” Skinner-Thompson said.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.

Dozens gathered to rally against the data center and demand that representatives of , the company building it, meet with them to discuss community concerns that grew as the large concrete building continued to rise last year.

Residents worry about potential impacts to their electricity bills, increased blackouts, emissions from the center’s emergency generators and the facility’s water use. Neighborhood groups representing people who live in Globeville, Elyria and Swansea are demanding that CoreSite work with them to protect residents from these possible impacts, and crafted a list of terms they want the company to abide by.

Denver Mayor Mike Johnston backs a moratorium on construction of new data centers in city

"If CoreSite wants to be a good neighbor, here's a proposal that's going to allow them to be a good neighbor," Alfonso Espino, lead organizer with the , told the crowd.

Nearly all of the houses in the three neighborhoods are within 1.5 miles of the future data center at East 49th Avenue and Race Street, Espino said. The center sits across the street from a park, a new affordable housing apartment building and a community health clinic.

“This isn’t being built in the middle of nowhere," Espino said in an interview last week. "It����ap being built right next to our park. Elyria is pretty small… It����ap being built next door to most of our residents.”

The , once completed, will offer more than 590,000 square feet of space for computer servers. It will be CoreSite's third and largest data center in Denver, where the company is headquartered.

The three-building facility will use a maximum of 65 megawatts to 75 megawatts of power at a time -- the same amount of power as up to 82,500 homes. The buildings will also require up to 805,000 gallons of water a day to cool its computer systems -- the same as 16,100 Denverites' average daily indoor water use.

Company officials previously said it is extremely rare to use the maximum amounts of power and water. CoreSite data centers typically use less than 50% of their capacity, they previously said.

But full buildout of the campus won't happen until the 2030s, if there is enough customer demand to warrant it, said Megan Ruszkowski, CoreSite's vice president of marketing and sales development.

Construction on the first floor of the first building is expected to finish in June, she said. The company will then add more floors of capacity to the first building -- which will use a maximum of 18 megawatts of power -- as customers sign on.

CoreSite operates colocation data centers, where multiple companies rent space for their servers and computing needs. The new facility will not be used to train artificial intelligence models or facilitate machine learning, Ruszkowski said.

The company sells spaces to a wide variety of industries, including health care, government and banking. Data centers make possible cloud services, online banking and smartphone apps.

“All of us are everyday data center users," she said.

Company leaders on Friday submitted a request to the city for to help create a "good neighbor" agreement between CoreSite and neighborhood groups, Ruszkowski said.

“Our relationship with the surrounding community is a really big priority to us," she said, noting the company is headquartered in Denver and many of its employees live here.

The company last year donated $25,000 to the Swansea Recreation Center and another $25,000 to the local Boys and Girls Club clubhouse, she said.

The data center is being built on the site of a closed cement factory. CoreSite plans to plant trees and other greenery as well as build a communal green space on the campus.

“We’re really excited about the aesthetic we’ll bring to the community," Ruszkowski said.

GES Coalition and other community organizations recently agreement. The neighborhoods closest to the data center are already some of the most polluted in Denver, the organizers noted. Already, the residents live with pollution from Interstate 70, a Superfund site, the Suncor Energy oil refinery and other industrial operations.

"That is why 'good neighbor' cannot mean PR, voluntary promises or private conversations," the coalition's proposal states. "In a frontline community like ours, being a good neighbor must be enforceable, measurable, publicly verifiable commitments, with real monitoring, public reporting and real consequences."

The proposal's demands include transparency around power and water usage, the completion of a study of the impacts of the data center on the community, disclosure around the use of generators, and the use of high-quality generators that limit emissions. The groups also want CoreSite to agree that it will not work with companies or governments that are involved in mass surveillance or immigrant deportations.

The coalition is calling for a resident board to hold the company accountable for its promises.

Eleven local organizations and more than 300 individuals signed onto the proposal.

CoreSite will at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday at the Geotech Environmental Equipment building, 2650 E. 40th Ave., to answer questions about the data center. Officials from Denver Water, Xcel Energy and the city of Denver will also attend.

The state’s Air Quality Control Commission earlier this year approved the five toxics the state should monitor, and this month set health-based standards to determine exactly how much of each of those toxics in the air puts people at a higher risk for cancer, asthma, reproductive health problems and other illnesses.

Now, the state agency that creates the rules is drafting a proposal detailing how the state should write and enforce the permits that industries, including oil and gas, need to operate.

Industry leaders expect they will pay for the new regulations through fees as the legislature figures out how to cut nearly $1 billion in spending, said Carly West, executive director of the American Petroleum Institute Colorado.

“The budget is going to play in every decision they make in the coming year,” West said. “There absolutely will be a state cost, and I will not be surprised if it����ap a fee-based regulation.”

Environmental advocates say the new regulation of air toxics, which was required under a 2022 bill called , will make the state’s air cleaner and its people healthier.

“This is an opportunity for Colorado to protect community members from toxic air contaminants that aren’t being regulated at the federal level,” said Rachael Jaffe, an associate attorney at Earthjustice who is working on the policy. “All of these have hefty health impacts.”

In January, the Air Quality Control Commission, which establishes regulatory policy for polluters, :

• Benzene, a carcinogen released when fossil fuels are burned, including in car exhaust and oil and gas extraction and production. It is also created by cement manufacturing, waste disposal and wood burning. Acute exposure may cause drowsiness, dizziness and headaches, as well as eye, skin and respiratory tract irritation, and unconsciousness at high levels. Chronic inhalation has caused cancer, various blood disorders and affects women’s reproductive organs, the Environmental Protection Agency has reported.
• Formaldehyde, a colorless, odorless gas used in household products, wood-product manufacturing and from burning fossil fuels. It causes skin, eye, nose and throat irritation and can cause cancer with high exposure levels.
• Ethylene oxide, which is used to make products such as antifreeze, textiles, adhesives, plastics and detergents. It����ap used to sterilize medical equipment, including at Terumo BTC in Lakewood. It causes cancers in humans, including lymphoma, myeloma, leukemia and breast cancer.
• Hexavalent chromium, a by-product of industrial processes such as metal fabricating and burning coal for electricity. It can leak into water systems and into the air. It can cause cancer and impact the respiratory system, kidneys, liver, skin and eyes, the EPA’s website says.
• Hydrogen sulfide, highly toxic gas that smells like rotten eggs. It is released by wastewater treatment facilities, meat processing facilities, petroleum refining, manufacturing of asphalt and roofing material, and places where large quantities of manure are stored. It can cause people to pass out due to high exposure. Low exposure can cause headaches, memory loss, balance problems and fatigue. It is not considered a carcinogen, but data is limited on how it affects children’s health or women’s reproductive health, according to the EPA.

On Sept. 19, the commission approved health-based standards for those five air toxics, which establishes the baseline for how much of each contaminant can be in the air without making people sick. The new benchmarks have standards based on cancer risks and non-cancer risks.

Environmentalists and industry representatives agreed that the Air Quality Control Commission used science-based evidence to formulate the new standards. The big question, though, will be how those standards are used in issuing permits and enforcing the law, West said.

“This is a really important step in the process,” she said. “That����ap when we will see it start to translate into what those benchmarks will mean. It could be a modest impact or a large impact.”

During a public hearing Wednesday, the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment’s Air Pollution Control Division presented a draft plan on how the air toxics will be permitted.

The division must file its report to the Colorado General Assembly by Dec. 31, and regulators expect it will need legislative approval because it could cost the state between $3.7 million to $10.7 million, depending on which of the three potential plans legislators adopt, according to a presentation from Laura Newman, the division’s construction permitting and permit modeling program manager.

The division did not include recommendations on how the state would pay for the permitting program.

The new program will affect more than 3,000 businesses in Colorado, with the oil and gas industry being the most impacted because fossil fuel extraction and burning emit tons of air pollution.

Colorado’s air regulators are proposing four options for which businesses would need permits.

One option would require universal permitting, meaning every business that emits the five toxics would need a permit, and another proposal would require universal permitting with some exceptions. A third option would require permitting only in areas where people are exposed to the toxics at higher rates than other parts of the state, and the final option would require permitting for the five toxics for companies that already must have air-pollution permits, according to Newman’s presentation.

The more companies required to apply for permits would mean the state would need to hire enough people to process those permits, inspect sites and enforce violations. Hence, the costs.

The division’s research shows “that the most affected industry would likely be the oil and gas extraction, followed by pipeline transportation, gasoline stations, utilities and then waste management,” Newman said.

Multiple people who attended the public meeting urged the air division to regulate as many polluters as possible and to require facilities that already release high levels of toxics to reduce their emissions, especially in neighborhoods where polluters operate, which typically are in areas populated by lower-income residents and minorities.

“We have to cast a broad net, and given our poor air quality here, we need to catch all the polluting sources that we can,” said Elizabeth Smith, who identified herself as a Wheat Ridge resident and as someone who suffers from asthma.

Not only will the company rely on greenhouse-gas credit auctions, but Suncor says it will need the state to create a fund to help companies finance projects that would lower emissions because it will not be able to cut enough at its through facility upgrades, according to a new report the company filed with the .

“Despite this major capital investment, onsite reductions will be insufficient to meet Suncor’s GHG emissions requirements,” the company’s report states.

Suncor’s investment in five projects at its Commerce City refinery and its determination that it cannot meet the state’s demands were revealed in a greenhouse-gas reduction plan posted on the state health department’s website this month.

Suncor and other large industrial polluters are required to submit under a state rule that requires Colorado’s 18 largest industrial manufacturers to reduce their overall greenhouse-gas emissions by 20% by 2030.

Thus far, eight companies have filed their plans, and Suncor is one of three companies that said it will struggle to meet Colorado’s reduction requirements without relying on the credit-trading system, which is allowed under state law.

The other two are and , and both wrote in their reports that while they will upgrade some equipment, it will not be enough to meet the state’s pollution-reduction demands.

American Gypsum, a drywall manufacturer in Eagle County, said it will buy greenhouse-gas credits on Colorado’s exchange market and alter its production to make a drywall that is a different size and thickness to reach its benchmark. The credit exchange allows companies that fail to meet benchmarks to buy credits from others that successfully cut emissions and use those credits to account for their excessive pollution.

Natural Soda, which mines and makes baking soda in Rifle, said it would also rely on the greenhouse-gas credit exchange until other technology was more feasible and cost-effective.

The other companies that have filed greenhouse-gas reduction plans are in Fort Morgan; , a sheet metal supplier in Fort Lupton; , a meat processor in Greeley; , an ethanol plant in Logan County; and its sister plant, Yuma Ethanol, based in Yuma County.

Those manufacturers said they will replace aging equipment and adopt new technology to reach their goals. For example, the two ethanol plants will use a carbon-capture system in which carbon dioxide is collected and then sent through a pipeline to be stored deep underground.

Cargill’s report said it would recycle biogas created from anaerobic wastewater treatment lagoons to power on-site boilers.

Of those eight companies, Suncor is the most high-profile because it is one of the largest polluters in Colorado, and it is close to densely populated neighborhoods in Commerce City and north Denver. The refinery has been under pressure for years to clean up its facility and has been fined for repeated violations of its federal air permits, which regulate how much pollution it is allowed to emit each year.

Suncor denied The Denver Post’s request for an interview about its emissions-reduction plan and sent an emailed statement that repeated what the company wrote in its report.

In its greenhouse-gas reduction plan, Suncor says it will upgrade technology in five areas, including improving two flares — also known as smokestacks — that burn off gases created during the refining process. Suncor is seeking state approval for one flare project that would reroute gas to a more modern stack and decommission an older, 100-foot stack that has been in operation for 75 years, according to its plan.

The other measures the company is proposing include improvements to its fluidized catalytic-cracking units, which help turn crude oil into gasoline, and installing carbon monoxide analyzers to ensure equipment is running efficiently.

Those five projects will cut 31,129 tons of carbon dioxide annually, the report said.  But Suncor needs to reduce its greenhouse-gas emissions by 133,266 tons annually to comply with state regulations, its reduction plan states.

In Suncor’s emailed statement and in the written report, the company said it is a pioneer in energy-efficient refining. “As background, the Commerce City refinery has long been an energy-efficiency leader in the refining sector — both among those refineries supplying Colorado and among similarly sized refineries nationwide.”

Suncor included an analysis and a letter from HSB Solomon Associates, a consultant it hired to analyze and compare its Commerce City emissions to other refineries, and that letter stated Suncor is the “best of the best” in its carbon emissions when compared against other refineries in the Rocky Mountain region.

“As a result of Suncor’s high level of efficiency in its operations, there is very little low-hanging fruit to further reduce GHGs at the Commerce City refinery,” the report stated.

However, the Commerce City refinery has had its share of problems. A 2023 Environmental Protection Agency report found the refinery records more malfunctions that release toxic chemicals into the air than other similarly sized plants in the United States.

Because the company said it cannot spend more money to meet the state’s greenhouse-gas limits, Suncor plans to use Colorado’s new greenhouse-gas credit trading system, which was created when the wrote regulations in 2023 that required the state’s largest industrial polluters to reduce emissions.

That rule was created after the General Assembly passed a aimed at improving the quality of life in neighborhoods most impacted by air pollution and reducing Colorado’s impact on climate change.

Colorado held its first greenhouse-gas credit auction this summer with five companies, including Suncor, spending $68,000 on credits. Those companies bought the credits because they are on track to miss the state’s first deadline to reduce emissions by 2030. However, state regulations prevent the disclosure of how many credits each company bought.

The Air Quality Control Commission has also asked the state’s Air Pollution Control Division to propose a state-managed fund that would help companies pay for emissions-reducing projects. That proposal is expected to be introduced to the commission in February when the state health department requests a hearing on it, and environmentalists are expected to oppose it, saying it creates a “pay-to-pollute” scheme that will allow Suncor and other heavy polluters to avoid making actual improvements to their facilities.

Greenhouse gases include carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and fluorinated gases that trap heat in the atmosphere. Those gases linger and circle the Earth, causing global warming and climate change that brings on more severe weather, such as rainstorms and intense summer heat. They also impact human health, causing respiratory and heart diseases, and some cancers.

The manufacturers that produce these gases typically are located in communities where the people are Black, Latino or Native American and earn less money than the state median income.

Colorado wants to eliminate 100% of its greenhouse-gas emissions by 2050.

Updated 4 p.m. Sept. 2, 2025: This story and headline have been updated to clarify that, while Suncor Energy will not be able to sufficiently cut emissions from its Commerce City refinery, the company will be able to purchase greenhouse-gas credits to meet Colorado’s climate goals. The story also incorrectly characterized a 2023 Environmental Protection Agency report as contradicting Suncor’s energy-efficiency claims.

However, details about how many credits those five companies purchased, and by how much they were allowed to offset emissions reductions through those purchases, remain a secret because state regulations prevent disclosure of those details.

The credit-trading program has been heavily criticized by environmentalists as a pay-to-pollute scheme that allows the state’s dirtiest industries to avoid making real changes to their greenhouse-gas emissions, which pollute the air and contribute to climate change.

The five companies that bid on credits were Cemex Construction Materials, a cement plant near Lyons; , which makes cement in Pueblo and Penrose; Sterling Ethanol, a chemical manufacturer in Sterling; Suncor Energy’s oil refinery in Commerce City; and Yuma Ethanol, a chemical manufacturer in Yuma, according to the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment’s auction summary. Sterling Ethanol and Yuma Ethanol are owned by

The sellers were Anheuser Busch’s ; Avago Technologies Wireless Manufacturing, which makes semiconductors and other electronic components in Fort Collins; and Western Sugar in Fort Morgan, according to the state’s auction summary.

Credits sold for about $25 each, and one credit equals one ton of carbon dioxide equivalents for one year. So if a company spent $100 at the auction, that company’s required emissions reduction would be four tons lower than what it otherwise would have been required to cut through improved technology or other measures.

In total, 2,760 credits were sold out of almost 106,280 credits offered.

Patrick Cummins, the health department’s director of environmental health and protection, said the state did not have any preconceived expectations going into the auction, but he was not surprised that so few credits were purchased.

“The companies offering and those bidding also didn’t know what to expect,” Cummins said.

Not every company that bid ended up buying credits, he said.

The Denver Post reached out to Suncor and Colorado AgriProducts to ask how the auction worked from their perspective, but representatives did not respond.

The details on which companies bought credits and how much they paid are kept secret to maintain a fair marketplace, Cummins said. If sellers knew how much a company was willing to pay, it could distort the market, he said.

Colorado’s Air Quality Control Commission, which establishes air pollution policies, created the greenhouse-gas credit-trading system while trying to come up with a plan to reduce by 20% the greenhouse-gas emissions from the state’s 18 largest manufacturers.

The plan allows companies that can lower their emissions beyond the mandated benchmark to sell credits to companies that struggle to meet the state’s emissions standards.

State regulators believed that by forcing the 18 largest industrial manufacturers to cut emissions, Colorado would move closer to its goal of eliminating all greenhouse-gas emissions by 2050. Those manufacturers include Suncor, Molson Coors, Western Sugar, Leprino Foods, Microchip Technology, JBS Foods and Cargill Meat Solutions, and they represent about 15% of all climate pollution emitted by industrial and manufacturing facilities in Colorado.

The majority of those 18 companies reduced their emissions below the specified levels they needed to meet in 2024 and did not need to buy credits, Cummins said.

The 18 companies will be evaluated and graded on their emissions reduction on a three-year cycle, and 2024 was the first year in the cycle, he said. There could be a greater demand for credits in the next two years as companies figure out how close they are to meeting the state’s mandated 2030 goal. But it is too early to predict whether some will rely on credits to make the goal, Cummins said.

Eight companies have told the state health department that they would achieve their 2030 reduction goals this year, Cummins said. Of the 18, only three exceeded the 2024 reduction requirements: Suncor, JBS Foods and Sterling Ethanol, according to the state’s greenhouse gas report.

Greenhouse gases include carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and fluorinated gases that trap heat in the atmosphere. Those gases linger and circle the Earth, causing global warming and that brings on more severe weather such as large forest fires, rainstorms and intense summer heat. They also impact human health, causing respiratory and heart diseases and some cancers.

Colorado is planning to by 50% by 2030 and to zero by 2050, and the credit-trading program is just one of multiple programs in place to help the state reach that goal.

Last year, the state approved a credit-trading program for natural-gas operators. Other programs include a push to get more electric vehicles on the road, require state and local governments to use electric lawn equipment, and to shutter the state’s coal-fired power plants by the end of 2030.

When the credit-trading program was approved in 2023, multiple environmental groups said the system would create a loophole that would allow the state’s biggest polluters, such as the Suncor refinery in Commerce City, to buy their way out of making serious greenhouse gas reductions.

But business leaders and the governor’s office wanted the credit-trading system, fearing that burdensome regulation would force some companies to move out of state.

June’s greenhouse-gas credit auction occurred with little fanfare. Multiple environmental groups contacted by The Post did not know it had happened. And that, too, was criticized because state regulators have promised to be transparent with the people who live in neighborhoods closest to those large polluters and who are most impacted by the pollution.

Ean Tafoya, of GreenLatinos, said no one told him that credits had been sold and he did not completely understand what had happened.

“I’m left with more questions than I have answers,” he said. “I’m disappointed there wasn’t more enhanced community engagement on such an important issue.”

Ian Coghill, senior attorney for Earthjustice, said he was surprised by how few credits were sold and how little the credits cost, especially since the state has determined the social cost of greenhouse gas emissions equals about $89 per ton. That essentially puts a price tag on how pollution impacts the environment and human health.

“I assumed the credits would go for much more money,” Coghill said.

Story update: This article was changed on July 23 to report the correct number of greenhouse gas credits that were offered at auction.

, an environmental group that advocates for the elimination of fossil fuels, says in its recently released report that it reviewed Suncor’s self-reported documents connected to the shutdown and determined there was a notable increase in the frequency of permit violations while the refinery was offline.

During that time, the plant released excessive amounts of sulfur dioxide, hydrogen sulfide, carbon monoxide and particulate matter such as soot, according to the report titled

The report counted each hour during which at least one of those regulated toxics was emitted. So if all four were released during the same hour, 350 Colorado counted that as four hours’ worth of permit violations.

At the time, people who live in neighborhoods surrounding the refinery hoped that the shutdown would result in cleaner air, but no one had looked into the data, said Heidi Leath, a climate policy analyst with 350 Colorado.

“They just thought they were going to get a break from the pollution,” she said. “We were really curious to see if the air quality would improve.”

The 350 Colorado report also looked at the three-month closure’s impact on gas prices and determined that although gas prices spiked at the time, the refinery does not help Colorado maintain lower gas prices.

Efforts to reach Suncor officials for this story were unsuccessful.

On Dec. 21, 2022, the Suncor refinery’s hydrogen plant malfunctioned during an extreme deep freeze, during which the temperature in Denver dropped 37 degrees in an hour, eventually plunging to -24 degrees. When the hydrogen plant tripped, it caused a cascade of problems for Suncor’s machinery, leading the company to shut down operations for three months to make repairs.

Suncor refines about 98,000 barrels of crude oil per day during normal operations and supplies about 40% of the gasoline used in Colorado. The state’s only refinery also produces diesel, jet fuel and liquid asphalt.

As for the pollution during the shutdown, refineries often release more chemicals during a malfunction as they race to stop production without creating a safety hazard, such as an explosion from accumulating fumes. They also tend to release more toxics when they restart production and calibrate their instruments.

But excessive emissions from those situations often are exempt from regulation, Leath said.

“They basically give a free pass and they allow emissions to go up during these periods and put people’s health at risk,” she said of state regulators.

That hasn’t stopped the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment from opening an investigation into potential violations during the 2022-2023 shutdown.

In January, the agency sent Suncor a compliance advisory, which is the first step in an investigation into permit violations, said Kate Malloy, a spokeswoman for the department’s Air Pollution Control Division.

That compliance advisory covers alleged violations that occurred between July 1, 2022, and June 30, 2023, including the shutdown and restart period from the deep freeze.

The agency will be looking into Suncor for exceeding its emissions limits for air pollutants, failing to meet required operating parameters and failing to follow required procedures for operating and maintaining equipment, according to .

In July, the state health department and the Environmental Protection Agency served a notice of violation to the refinery, the first step in an enforcement action after both agencies discovered violations during inspections between 2020 and 2023. That notice is still pending.

Government investigations into environmental violations can take years, and they also allow companies to negotiate penalties.

In February 2024, the state hit Suncor with a $10.5 million penalty, the largest in Colorado history for air permit violations. That fine was for excessive pollution between July 2019 and June 2021.

A $9 million fine announced in 2020 covered multiple air pollution violations since 2017.

As for gas prices and their connection to Suncor’s operation in Commerce City, they rose dramatically during the shutdown — 51% in Colorado. Drivers paid as much as $4.10 per gallon during the winter months following the malfunction. Winter gasoline prices are typically cheaper because of lower demand.

But 350 Colorado argues in its report that Suncor’s presence does not benefit Colorado drivers overall when it comes to the price they pay at the pump. The study found that over the past five years, Colorado has seen higher gas prices than 85% of the states without refineries and higher prices than 79% of the states with them.

“Everybody said gas prices would rise, and they did in the short term,” Leath said. “But would it really be true that we would have higher gas prices in Colorado if we didn’t have the Suncor refinery? To our surprise, honestly, most of the states that don’t have refineries have lower gas prices.”

Grier Bailey, executive director of the , which represents gas retailers, was highly critical of the 350 Colorado report.

“In summary, it seems clear the entire ‘report’ relative to gas prices is a hit piece designed to assuage a policy audience that there won’t be any impact on fuel prices if far-left fringe groups like 350 get their way,” Bailey said. “That is simply not something that is responsible to assert.”

Bailey said the comparison between average gas prices in Colorado and other states did not take into account things such as taxes and other fees that Colorado places on suppliers and distributors, which eventually end up in the prices consumers pay. Those amount to about 30 cents per gallon and are slated to rise in the coming years.

He warned that it would be a mistake to close the Suncor refinery because people would still need all the products it supplies, meaning fuel would be delivered via pipeline, rail or trucks, which would increase emissions from pipeline terminals, place more trucks on the roads and put an additional cost burden on consumers to pay for the transportation to get fuel delivered.

Finally, it was unfair for the report to fail to acknowledge the extraordinary steps the oil and gas industry, Gov. Jared Polis and others took to keep the state supplied with fuel during the shutdown, Bailey said. He accused 350 Colorado of omitting key points to bolster its position that Suncor should be permanently closed.

“Trying to dress up a policy position paper as a ‘study’ doesn’t impress serious people who are trying to keep Colorado’s economy moving,” he said.

Re: “City Council rejects $25M contract with Suncor,” May 7 news story

How arrogant and misguided is Councilwoman Shontel Lewis who said she would vote no on the asphalt contract because Suncor is a major contributor to ongoing environmental justice problems in North Denver. As if this has anything to do with getting our roads paved for a reasonable price.

The Commerce City refinery will make asphalt. It is what they do. Asphalt is a (small) percentage of every crude oil barrel. The crude oil barrel also includes other refinery products such as gasoline and jet fuel. Suncor’s crude oil comes from the tar sands in Canada, which are heavy oils and have higher residue (asphalt), and the local Denver-Julesburg Basin crude, which is a sweet, honey-like domestic crude. So, to get the valuable products like gasoline and jet fuel, the refinery will make asphalt.

Now, however, the residents of Denver get to pay an additional $300,000 over the life of the contract for the Denver City Council’s arrogance.

Bill Koch, Broomfield

The alarming threat of Medicaid cuts

Cutting Medicaid benefits for millions of Americans who are disabled, retired, caregivers, between jobs, or working but not making enough to afford other health care is cruel and unnecessary. It is not about saving money but increasing the gap between the rich and the poor. Many Americans will die or become homeless because of these cuts.

We need to keep opposing these attacks on our safety-net programs as loudly as we can.

Cheryl Kasson, Denver

To some of us just-getting-by families, it’s just another push down. Funding is cut to the people who need it the most. They rely on it to stay alive. Party affiliation means nothing when it comes to a cry for help from citizens. We’d all like to enjoy our lives and care for our children without additional burden.

This program should never be tampered with until you come up with something that would curb hospital costs and provide coverage that benefits humans equally.

Robert Auerbach, Centennial

Keep resources available to nurture our young talent

Re: “,” May 8 news story

With great alarm, I read the May 2025 CU report that 54 research awards have been terminated or halted. America’s young adults, who are striving to develop careers and families for our future, are facing the greatest economic challenge in decades. Especially brutal are the thousands of DOGE and Trump-era cuts to tuition assistance and the slashing of internships and research grants in the science, medical and engineering fields.

I have encountered dozens of people who have informed me of canceled government funding sources that are demolishing career prospects for many who do not have family or other monetary safety nets.

Reaching back to the early 1970s, had I not had an engineering college co-op program job with U.S. Air Force at Wright Patterson Air Force Base providing funds for tuition and even my basic living needs, my long engineering career in nuclear and aerospace might well have been extinguished. Let����ap get more tax contributions from the ultra-rich and not smash the formation of young talent for our future.

Ronald L. Puening, Centennial

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