The 2025 Regular Session Data
- March 18, 2025
Mr. Chairman, members of the committee thank you for the opportunity to testify today. My name is Michael Sandoval. I am the senior energy policy analyst for the Independence Institute, a state-based, free market think tank, headquartered in Denver. The Independence Institute is opposed to HB17-1116 not in intent, but in process. We do think
READ MOREBy Amy Oliver Cooke and Michael Sandoval Is it time to eliminate the Office of Consumer Counsel (OCC) and elect our Commissioners who serve on the Public Utilities Commission (PUC)? Maybe. Our recent insider perspective on the so-called approval process by supposedly neutral regulators leaves us pondering that very question. The most recent Xcel Energy
READ MOREDeveloping story One of the worst kept secrets in Colorado energy policy circles finally is public thanks to PoliticoPro. Governor John Hickenlooper has floated a draft executive order to slash carbon emissions from the power generating sector by 35 percent by 2030, as compared to 2012 levels. Doing his best President Obama impersonation, the Governor
READ MOREBy John Knetemann and contributors Xcel Energy’s well of public support for the Rush Creek Wind Farm, a $1.1 billion, 95,000-acre wind farm boondoggle on Colorado’s Eastern Plains appears to be poisoned. Conventional wisdom says Xcel’s application along with the so-called public approval process via the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) for the Rush Creek Wind
READ MOREOn April 11, 2016, former Colorado Governor, Bill Ritter, spoke to Colorado Public Radio host Ryan Warner about renewable energy and energy costs in Colorado. Warner pressed Ritter on the issue of costs, saying: Cost is central, central to the debate that is raging in the courts right now, in the state legislature, over the
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