The Colorado Public Utilities Commission released an anticipated report Tuesday that confirmed what critics have suspected: performance issues at the Comanche 3 power plant near Pueblo makes electricity generated from coal a costly proposition. 

The 89-page, highly technical report is blunt in places, blaming poor maintenance, equipment defects and poor communications among the reasons for the costly issues that have dogged the last coal-fired plant built in Colorado.

Public Service Commission Report on Comanche 3 coal plantJoeyBunch, Colorado Politics
joey.bunch@coloradopolitics.com
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Despite being Xcel’s newest plant, it has been its most unreliable the last decade, the investigation states, alleging it has racked up an average of 91.5 days of outages over its 10-year lifespan.

“The significant performance issues at Comanche 3 support Staff’s position that Company-owned generation should be subject to a performance standard to ensure it delivers the value proposition that led to its approval,” the PUC report states.

Xcel spokeswoman Michelle Aguayo said Tuesday night that the company was still reviewing the report, but, “Meanwhile, we are committed to the continued safe and reliable operation of the plant through its proposed early retirement in 2040.”

She pointed to the utility’s drive to renewable energy faster than expected and get out of the coal business in Colorado, per the wishes of Gov. Jared Polis and the state’s Climate Action Plan.

“We are dedicated to operating our power plants with the safest industry standards and continue to look for ways we can grow, learn and improve how we run our generation fleet,” Aguayo said. “We appreciate the Commission staff’s time in reviewing operations at Comanche 3.”

The plant was originally expected to cost $680 million to bring online, but overshot its budget to $784 million, with an additional $72 million the last 10 years.

When it was proposed in 2004, Comanche 3 was expected to operate until 2070.

The plant, however, has dealt with those performance issues at the same time it has faced the consequential economics of green energy and the environmental heckles of generating electricity with coal.

Xcel has amended its timeline to 2040, when it will phase out the use of coal, according to an announcement of its plans to shift to renewable energy last week.

Xcel Energy’s plant was the home of problems even before it began generating electricity, including boiler tube leaks in 2009. The plant has had issues with the welded components in its boiler and a malfunctioning water cannon.

In January of last year, turbine damage cost $4.8 million plus $1.7 million to buy replacement power because of it.

Then last June, an issue that caused the loss of lubrication for the steam turbine, along with other equipment damage, rang up another $20.4 million in losses, with $14 million in replacement power, the report states.

The Public Utilities Commission,  which regulates the utility, asked for an investigation of the costly malfunctions in October to find root causes.

Xcel, the plant’s primary owner, sought to pass $11.7 million for repairs to customers last year, but the PUC said no, although it still allowed $45.3 million in increases that were expected to add a little over a dollar a month to the average Xcel user’s bill.

The ask to ratepayers is based on the cost to replace the plant’s finishing superheater after it operated for just five years. The PUC said the company should have recognized the costly design flaw to begin with.

“I hope this is the last time that Xcel Energy wastes millions of customer dollars to fix outdated coal energy technology,” Anna McDevitt, the senior campaign representative for Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal initiative, said in a statement.

“It’s 2021; any expenditures on fossil fuels is a step backwards when we could be saving customers money with cheaper, cleaner alternatives.”

She called keeping Comanche 3 online another 20 years a “money pit.”