The country’s biggest advocate for senior citizens is urging the Colorado Public Utilities Commission to reject Xcel Energy’s proposal to increase energy rates by nearly $200 million, arguing it would disproportionately hit low-income and fixed-income residents.

AARP Colorado said the rate hike, if approved, will hammer residents who can least afford their energy bills and argued it would sit atop the surge in the price of natural gas in the last few months and additional expenses arising out of the cold spell in February last year that utilities are passing on to their customers.

The group also lamented that legislators have allowed the state’s regulated utilities to pass on costs to consumers instead of having their shareholders shoulder that burden and Coloradans are bearing the brunt of state policymakers’ vision of a carbon-free society.  

Xcel Energy, which serves 1.5 million Coloradans, is seeking the Colorado Public Utilities Commission’s permission to hike energy rates by $182.2 million. Initially, the company sought a $338.5 million increase, but several parties, including the commission’s staffers, agreed to settle at $182.2 million.

That translates to a rate hike of $5.24 for residential customers and and $6.64 for commercial ratepayers. If approved, the new rates would take effect on April 1, 2022.

In a filing with the commission, Xcel said the proposed settlement serves the public interest.

“The diversity of interests represented in this proceeding helped ensure that this negotiated settlement agreement serves the public interest,” Xcel told state regulators. “If approved, this settlement will result in just and reasonable rates and this settlement is consistent with Colorado law.”

And in a statement after the parties reached the agreement, the energy company said the proposed settlement would ensure “we continue to deliver benefits and investments that will improve service reliability, protect our customers, strengthen grid resilience, enhance the customer experience and deliver more low-cost, clean energy to Coloradans.”

But AARP Colorado said residential ratepayers would bear the brunt of the rate hike among Xcel Energy’s classes of customers. 

The group also criticized the Colorado General Assembly, saying it has decided to fund the state’s transition to renewable on the backs of Coloradans.  

“Our biggest concern is the pancaking of all these rate increases, many of them put on by the legislature to transition into clean energy,” said Bill Levis, former chief of the Office of Consumer Counsel, which is now called the Utility Consumer Advocate.

Levis noted a recent law mandating the Public Utilities Commission to consider how its actions would affect disproportionately impacted communities. 

“The legislature is sending two distinct and contradictory messages – one, the consumers will have to pay for all of the transition to clean energy, and, at the same time, the commission must ensure disadvantaged communities don’t absorb the cost,” Levis told Colorado Politics. 

He added: “The commission is in a conundrum because they have to enforce the law that the legislature passed.”

Levis made the same argument during a public hearing late on Wednesday.

In a statement, AARP Colorado said it “strongly supports” the transition to renewable energy, but it is “extremely concerned that residential ratepayers, who can least afford it, are being asked to absorb an unfair percentage of the costs.”

The commission is deliberating on Xcel Energy’s rate hike request at a time when millions of Coloradans face steep increases in energy bills this winter, with some having to pay as much as 50% more compared to last winter, and as residents struggle to keep up with soaring inflation while the global COVID-19 pandemic hammers the state and the rest of the country.

Filings with Colorado’s regulatory body showed that an average energy consumer in an Xcel Energy territory will pay an additional $132.86 over a five-month period beginning in November this year and ending in March of next year.

The sharp rise in natural gas prices is primarily fueling the rate hike, but actions by state regulators and policymakers have also contributed.

In the case of Xcel Energy, the spike also emanates from an earlier rate hike approved by the Colorado Public Utilities Commission and, to a lesser extent, a law mandating utilities to charge customers more to help finance an energy assistance program for low-income residents. State officials said that small cost to consumers translates to big help for the state’s most economically vulnerable residents.