Public Utilities Commissioners Are Finally Taking Xcel Cost Recovery Complaints Seriously

After months of consumers sounding the alarm about high Xcel Energy bills, the Colorado Public Utilities Commission seems to finally be listening to complaints about the company’s lack of accountability and proposed price hikes as it considers how Xcel will recover the costs of closing coal plants in the coming years.

At an April 6 hearing, Chairman Eric Blank made direct references to public comments about the current case before the commission, which sees the PUC weighing a settlement between Xcel and intervening parties, including several environmental groups and the Office of the Utility Consumer Advocate, that would allow Xcel to turn four retiring coal plants — Craig 2, Hayden 1, Hayden 2, and the coal portion of Pawnee — into regulatory assets.

Those assets would…