Xcel pitches $15 billion clean energy plan

1 year ago 435

Good morning, Colorado.

I’ve been trying to make the most of these warm days in the Denver metro while keeping my eye on when temps will inevitably drop again.

Watch out for Friday, everybody. By the way, thanks to everyone who responded to yesterday’s announcement about The Sun becoming a nonprofit. We are excited about this new path and grateful for all of the support so many of you showed us yesterday. We promise to work hard to earn it! (It’s also never too late to make a donation)

Now, on to the news.

ENVIRONMENT

Xcel Energy pitches new clean energy plan for Colorado that is nearly twice as costly as one it offered in 2021

A Washington County wind farm seen in June 2022. (Olivia Sun, The Colorado Sun via Report for America)

Xcel Energy has a vision for Colorado’s clean energy future — one with 7,100 megawatts of new generation and storage, nearly $3 billion in new transmission lines and 26% more generation. It also comes with a $15 billion price tag that’s twice as expensive as an earlier plan that was approved. Mark Jaffe has more.

READ MORE

24 ideas floated for saving water and protecting Colorado River from drought, climate change. Colorado River Drought Task Force has worked up recommendations for protecting rivers and wildlife habitat, fixing leaking water delivery systems and adding flexibility to shared water programs, Fresh Water News’ Jerd Smith reports.

EDUCATION

15 years after Colorado paved way for a new kind of school, students are falling short

Fifth grade teacher Liz Banesberger, left, instructs students during a reenactment of ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ on Tuesday at C3, or Creativity Challenge Community in southeast Denver. (Olivia Sun, The Colorado Sun via Report for America)

Innovation schools were designed to give struggling public schools more flexibility and control in how they teach kids. But a recent report by the nonpartisan Keystone Policy Center found that the schools are largely failing to ensure students meet grade-level benchmarks. Erica Breunlin has more.

READ MORE

ARTS & CULTURE

A new Colorado film festival brings modern meaning to a historic barn

The Yellow Barn Farm’s namesake barn stored hay for decades when the farm served as an equestrian center. Since 2021, sisters Azuraye and Devon Wycoff have worked to convert it into an event space. They’ll host the inaugural Yellow Barn Film Festival here on Saturday. (Photo by Devon Wycoff)

There’s a historic yellow barn sitting in the foothills west of Longmont. But if you head there this weekend, you won’t find hay stored inside, but rather people gathered for a one-day film festival. Yellow Barn Farm was once a thriving equestrian center. These days it’s an incubation site for all kinds of cultural and agricultural experiments, Parker Yamasaki writes.

READ MORE

🔑 = source has article meter or paywall

Tuberculosis cases rise in Colorado, says UCHealth. The state has seen a nearly 60% increase in tuberculosis cases from last year, with 84 cases and two deaths. The deadly infectious disease had been on a 10-year decline in the state before this year.
— 9News Former federal Judge: Court challenge to keep Trump off GOP presidential primary in Colorado is not about politics. “I don’t have any doubt that the Supreme Court of Colorado will see the error that Judge Wallace made in her holding that the 14th Amendment doesn’t even apply to the former president,” former federal judge J. Michael Luttig told CPR.
— CPR News Lower mortgage rates not enough to overcome November slowdown in metro Denver home sales. Buyers closed on 2,664 homes and condos last month, a 15.9% drop from the 3,169 homes sold in October. November closings were down 14% year-over-year.
— Greeley Tribune The Denver Post building’s pending sale signals a major downtown recovery push. The city’s proposal to buy the 11-story building at 101 W. Colfax would provide space for district, county, probate and juvenile courts as part of a larger effort to revitalize downtown.
— Axios Denver

Old Firehouse Books suggests a diverse array topics for December

Each week as part of SunLit — The Sun’s literature section — we feature staff recommendations from bookstores across Colorado. This week, the staff from Old Firehouse Books in Fort Collins recommends:

“George Washington Carver: A Life” by Christina Vella, a biography of an extraordinary man “The Secret to SuperHuman Strength” by Alison Bechdel, a graphic novel of personal growth “And Then She Fell” by Alicia Elliott, an Indigenous mystery

Read what the bookstore staff had to say about each. Pick up a copy and support your local bookstores at the same time.

RECOMMENDATIONS