Comments on Xcel Energy IRP in Minnesota

Source: Greentech Media

Client: Sierra Club

Author: Tyler Comings

February 2021

AEC Senior Researcher Tyler Comings assisted in Sierra Club's comments on Xcel Energy’s 2020-2034 Upper Midwest Resource Plan--along with Synapse Energy Economics, Grid Strategies, and Telos Energy. Mr. Comings developed alternative modeling assumptions, including for wind, solar and battery storage costs. Mr. Comings also contributed to comments on Xcel's methodology and its plans to build a new natural gas combined cycle plant.

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Comments on Xcel Energy Minnesota's 2018 Mankato Proposal

Photo of Mankato Energy Center from POWER Engineering news article

Client: Sierra Club

Authors: Sierra Club with assistance from AEC (Tyler Comings, Liz Stanton, PhD, and Eliandro Tavares)

March 2019

On behalf of Sierra Club, Senior Researcher Tyler Comings, Clinic Director and Senior Economist Liz Stanton, PhD and Assistant Researcher Eliandro Tavares assisted with comments on Xcel Minnesota's proposal to acquire the Mankato natural gas plant. The Sierra Club concluded that the proposal should be denied because it was not economically justified and ran counter to the utility's greenhouse gas emission goals.

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Minnesota Power EnergyForward Testimony

Client: Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy and Fresh Energy

Author: Liz Stanton, PhD

March 2018

Clinic Director and Senior Economist Liz Stanton, PhD submitted testimony in Minnesota PUC Docket No. E-015/GR-17-568 regarding Minnesota Power's petition for approval of its EnergyForward Resource Package critiques the Company's future load and energy requirements, and its estimates of the capacity required for the system.

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Review of Minnesota Utilities' Resource Planning

Client: Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy

Authors: Liz Stanton, PhD

October 2017

On behalf of the Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy, Clinic Director and Senior Researcher Liz Stanton, PhD evaluated Minnesota's electric utilities' resource planning including Great River Energy's Integrated Resource Plan (IRP) and Minnesota Power's EnergyForward docket. Resource Plans are filed with the Utility Commission to demonstrate that utilities’ decisions to retire and/or add electric generation resources are in the public interest. While technical, these evaluations provide an important benefit to utility customers and the Minnesota public more widely. Third-party review of these and other utilities filings is critical to vet for errors, uncover questionable or self-serving assumptions, and make hidden value-judgments transparent.