The Boulder City Council will meet with Xcel Energy representatives during this week’s study session, giving councilmembers a rare chance to question the utility about its efforts to cut carbon emissions, protect energy infrastructure from wildfires, and clean up its coal ash storage site on the city’s eastern edge.
The discussion is expected to focus on Boulder’s 2020 franchise agreement with Xcel, which voters approved after ending the city’s decade-long push to create a municipal electric utility. The agreement set targets for emissions reductions and improving grid resilience against extreme weather and wildfires.
Xcel has committed to stop burning coal by 2030, but a recent presentation revealed it still plans to use natural gas well beyond that date, raising questions about whether Boulder’s goal of becoming net-zero by 2035 is within reach.
The meeting comes nearly a year after Xcel cut power across much of Boulder with little notice, leaving critical facilities and businesses in the dark. The utility shut off electricity to prevent power lines from sparking wildfires amid strong winds, but the lack of warning drew widespread criticism. Some councilmembers are expected to press Xcel on what it’s doing to prevent a repeat.
At least one councilmember is also seeking more details on Xcel’s cleanup efforts at its coal ash storage site at the former Valmont Power Station. An award-winning 2023 investigation by Boulder Reporting Lab and CU Boulder students found that toxic chemicals from the site’s 1.6 million tons of coal ash, containing heavy metals like arsenic, have leached into groundwater, likely spreading toward a nearby residential area in unincorporated Boulder County.