Unnecessary Power Outage

The recent multi-county Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS) came as a terrible surprise to my family. We had never heard of this, and certainly never experienced one. We are shocked at how it was explained versus how it actually happened. Moreover, we are surprised that the program was approved by the Public Utilities Commission in June 2025 but never communicated to ALL Xcel customers at that time. As a long-time resident and customer, we were never advised about this planned program, or asked to give commentary input, or allowed to ask questions.

This particular PSPS seemed to have caused much more harm than good. Thousands of customers were without power for days or were at least threatened with possibly not having electricity for days. These customers lost income, had no heat, experienced ruined food, were unable to cook meals, some were unable to have kids in school or daycare, others were not able to care for elderly parents at home, etc., etc. Furthermore, it was especially harmful to businesses since it occurred near the Christmas and Hanukkah holidays and many businesses depend on high sales volume at this time. Individual residential households suffered hundreds of dollars in lost food and unplanned expenses to deal with no electricity at home. Many businesses suffered losses in the thousands of dollars. Not everyone could purchase or use generators or have somewhere else to stay. Finally, we found out that no compensation for any of these losses would be paid by Xcel Energy.

We live in a suburban area with no above ground power lines, yet we were slated for the planned power turn off Wednesday December 17^th. We began getting warnings a couple of days ahead. Since we had never heard of a PSPS and it seemed that the warning did not equate to a definite outage for us, we weren’t too concerned. Despite a warning, our power did not get turned off December 17^th although neighbors a block away did lose power on that day and continued to be out when we all got a second advisory December 18^th. Since the first power turn off never happened for us, we didn’t trust the truth of the second advisory. Unfortunately, power did turn off early morning December 19^th and remained off for about 30 hours. We were told many different time periods for the outage to end and got conflicting communications about power being back on. Worst case we were told was that it could take up to 3 or 4 DAYS to restore power but thankfully it did not come to that.

Xcel claims the PSPS decision was due to high wind and dry weather forecasts so as to prevent wind driven wildfires from down power lines. We know the 2021 Marshall Fire history looms large, yet to us who live in a community with underground utilities, surrounded by other communities also with underground utilities the PSPS appears to be overreach. The cities of Golden or Arvada do not have a history of any named wildfire event like the Marshall Fire. Also, winds over 50 mph and humidity of 20% or less, plus dry ground conditions are very eternal in front range Colorado.

We lost approximately $335 worth of food. This is devastating to seniors on fixed incomes such as Social Security. We don’t own generators. Although we experienced some limited number of wind gusts on December 17^th, we had rather low or no wind for most of the power outage period of up to four days for some in our community. We are homeowners just trying to survive and our homeowner insurance deductible is over the dollar value of the food that is spoiled and they probably wouldn't cover it anyway.

We are very worried and stressed about the next time Xcel might invoke another PSPS. We don’t want to purchase new food and have it destroyed again. We are also disturbed by the rather strange electrical grid areas for the outages. Some homes a few blocks away from us never lost power and, for example, King Soopers at Candelas always had power yet homes on all sides of them lost power. They were all in the same path of wildfire risk supposedly.

Perhaps Xcel should have been working more in recent years to put more lines underground, replace old wooden poles with metal, cut down all trees near power lines, make grids into smaller more precise areas to minimize power shut off to unnecessarily large areas, harden the outdoor power substations, etc. It seems Xcel was emphasizing other things instead of standard infrastructure. For example, replacing all our meters with time of use capability when outdated power lines and girds were ignored.

It appears Xcel has wasted money on “green” energy while raking in massive profits operating as a monopoly all while neglecting standard infrastructure. The winds we experienced in December were not more than we have had often in the past, and power was not turned off pre-emptively over those many years. We do agree with Governor Polis as he states: Coloradans deserve the absolute best in energy reliability, safety, and affordability. The recent PSPS was not a messaging failure but rather does not address inherent weakness and lack of sophistication in our local electrical grid. Recently I saw a commentary by Bob Frenzel, CEO of Xcel Energy, on Xcel’s participation in GridEx. This national exercise is meant to improve resilience against cyber and physical attacks on our power grids. I can only laugh and be afraid because Xcel cannot even protect our local grid against common Colorado winds.

Electrical power outages are not merely inconveniences. They are a life, health, and safety event. People lose power for oxygen concentrators, CPAP machines, and refrigerated medicines. Homes lose heat in winter and cooling in the summer. Families on wells lose water, including water that firefighters may need. Schools, nursing homes, and public facilities cannot operate safely without dependable service and clear timelines for restoration.

Please make Xcel Energy improve the electrical grid in Colorado and stop causing harm with Public Safety Power Shutoffs.

Sincerely,

Cynthia Morrell

Arvada, Colorado