Commissioner Gilman and Staff Tour Xcel’s Trading Floor
Have you ever wondered how Xcel Energy predicts the weather? Commissioner Gilman and staff members learned a lot by touring Xcel's 1800 Photo: Drew Bolin, PUC Strategic Communications Larimer Street Jason Peuquet, PUC Economist, Xcel director, Headquarters' Trading Regulatory Administration Floor as part of Bill Dalton, engineer, Energy Section, PUC a tour on Jack Ihle, Xcel regional vice-present, May 5 and 9. Regulatory Policy Steve Berman, Xcel regional vice-president, From the 10th floor, Regulatory Policy and Pricing trading desks, Xcel trades in power, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Using computer models, 20 traders figure out how much electricity customers are going to use the next day, where they can get it most cheaply — and, if they can, sell some into the market.
The trading floor also operates plant operations and trading for Southwestern Public Service Company (SPS) in Texas and Northern States Power Company (NSP) in Minnesota.
The key to the market is the weather because that largely determines how much heating or cooling customers are going to use.
Trading floor staff use the relatively new DNV's weather-energy demand model to try to forecast energy needs with a margin of error of less than 10 percentage points. DNV is a company that produces monitoring equipment for forecasting.
DNV has developed an advanced tool that “uses very granular data from the past 20 years to create the equivalent of 10,000 years of plausible realities.”
The 40+ power-operations staff, who work on the trading floor, decides which power plants should run and at what capacity.
After the weather, the next biggest determinant of what happens is the daily cost of natural gas.
Then the traders look at whether they can buy power cheaper on the market than Xcel can produce itself and whether they can sell electricity for more than it costs Xcel to generate.
Xcel’s Northern States Power Co. is part of the computerized midwestern power market, so the trader in Denver puts into the system bid and asks prices to see automatically what is available.
Colorado has no such market, but Xcel Energy began its participation on April 1st as a member of the Western Energy Imbalance Service Market (WEIS), which is run by the Southwest Power Pool (SPP). SPP operates its Western Energy Imbalance Service market (WEIS) on a contract basis, centrally dispatching energy from the region’s participating resources every five minutes.
At the time of the May 5th tour, Colorado power generation comprised of 41 percent wind power and 17 percent solar power. In fact, there was a surplus of energy that was being used to pump water uphill to the Cabin Creek Pumped Storage reservoir above Georgetown, Colorado.
Xcel VP Jack Ihle mentioned that the new “Thunderwolf” 100 Megawatt (MW) utility-scale battery storage was about to begin testing. Thunderwolf is the result of the Phase II decision by the Commission in Xcel's 2018 Electric Resource Plan (ERP).
PUC's Strategic Communications Section Chief Drew Bolin contributed to this article.
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Senate Bill 21-272 Equity Update
The Commission has been engaged in a long-term process to implement Senate Bill 21-272, through which the agency will make rules that incorporate equity and considerations regarding disproportionately impacted communities in its work.
Staff work to implement SB 21-272 is increasing and we anticipate announcing public-facing activities in the summer and fall. Recent actions include:
- Commissioner Gilman hosted a workshop to demonstrate how to use the Colorado EnviroScreen tool and to learn from other state agencies about how they are implementing changes in their rules and practices related to disproportionately impacted communities. Slides, notes, and other materials are available here.
- The agency has begun a partnership with the Energy Equity Project at the University of Michigan to develop an equity framework that will guide its work.
- The General Assembly adopted House Bill 23-1233, which modifies the definition of disproportionately impacted community so that it's more standard across state agencies.
Visit puc.colorado.gov/equity for more information about upcoming events and to view progress updates. If you would like emails about upcoming events as they are scheduled, please contact PUC_SB272equity@state.co.us.
Recent and Upcoming Public Comment Hearings
May 30:
Towing Rules and Regulations
The PUC will have a public comment hearing to examine and consider revisions to towing carrier rules based on the 2022 Colorado Assembly passage of House Bill 22-1314 (HB 22-1314). The law went into effect Aug. 10, 2022, and is designed to protect consumers of nonconsensual tows, or when companies tow vehicles without the owner’s consent. A public comment hearing was held on Tuesday, May 30, and an additional public comment hearing is scheduled for Tuesday, July 25, at 11:30 a.m. Check the calendar of events page for additional information.
May 31 and July 11:
Public Service Company of Colorado (Xcel Energy’s) electric tariff to increase rates.
Two remote public comment hearings are scheduled for Xcel Energy's electric rate case. One is scheduled for Weds., May 31, from 4-6 p.m. The second is scheduled for Tues., July 11, from 4-6 p.m. The public comment hearings allow consumers to give oral statements regarding Xcel Energy's request to increase its electric base rate revenues, with higher base rates for all electric rate schedules and to make other tariff changes. The rate case is identified as Proceeding Nos. 22AL-0478E and 22AL-0530E.
What You Need to Know: Xcel Energy is seeking an annual increase in base rate revenue of approximately $310 million. The estimated bill impact from the proposed increase in electric rates is 8.2 percent per average monthly bill for residential customers and 7.8 percent per average monthly bill for small commercial customers.
When: Wed., May 31, 4-6 p.m. Participate via Zoom here. Tue., July 11, 4-6 p.m. Participate via Zoom here. An evidentiary hearing is scheduled by Decision No. C23-0158 for July 6 -14, and July 19-July 21, 2023.
June 1:
Railroad Safety Regulations
As part of Proceeding No. R23-0274-I, a public comment hearing is scheduled for Thursday, June 1, from 11:30 a.m., continuing until concluded, but no later than 5:30 p.m.
To participate, via Zoom, click here.
Other Public Meetings and How to Participate:
The Colorado Public Utilities Commission (PUC) serves the public interest by effectively regulating utilities and facilities so that the people of Colorado receive safe, reliable, and reasonably-priced services consistent with the economic, environmental and social values of our state.
The PUC welcomes and encourages public comments. A comment is a statement of opinion about any issue the Commission may decide. It may be about a specific proceeding or more general in nature and can include recommendations for what the Commission should do.
Opportunities for comment include workshops, informational meetings, community meetings, and public comment hearings. Some of these activities are led by agency staff, and others are led by Commissioners or Judges, and some are more formal than others. More general comments can be provided at any time without regard to whether the issue is currently pending.
There are several ways to learn about comment opportunities at the Commission:
- Sign up for the Commission’s email updates. This includes media advisories and notifications about public comment hearings, community meetings, and other events. - Check the public calendar for upcoming events and ways to participate. - Review our key proceedings page to see what kinds of cases are currently open for comment. - Look at E-Filings for a particular proceeding. E-Filings is the Commission’s online system for managing filings in proceedings. You can search for individual proceedings or documents, or subscribe for email updates.
- Check news releases for public meeting announcements.
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