Xcel Energy partnership agreement

we had a strong advocate for municipalization and then re regulatory changes that include clear penalties and payments from Excel

it's not taking over our utility system from Excel but rather thinking about how the um bonding power and the financing ability

our franchise agreement with Excel does not have a lot of hard things. they either meet the goals and our options are to uh take an off-ramp.

when they trusted us to re-enter a franchise agreement that it pays off

And then we'll wrap things up with going over our border emissions targets through our energy partnership agreement

since we reentered our franchise and started our energy partnership agreement in our second border report

Xcel Energy Partnership Update Staff Time: 30 Min Council Time: 60 Min Total Time: 90 Min

Proposed Land Use Agreement with Public Service Company of Colorado (d/b/a Xcel Energy) on McStain/Shanahan #2 Open Space

I'm the partnership manager for our partnership with Xcel Energy

we're able to work hand-in-hand with the Excel engineers and say, you know, here's the problem here

Required at least 73 parking spaces. Per the partnership agreement. And we went and asked the investor, can we change that?

Xcel is doing a study of what can they do to upgrade gas and

we can't run current without owning the power lines

what we do have is the partnership agreement and goals, laid out there that they have to hit those emissions milestones

I believe You had presented to the board once on the whole municipalization process, and and our partnership with Excel

Even if XL Energy meets some of our objectives as an energy provider from outside of our community

Council's desire to send a letter to Xcel Energy that really is memorializing a lot of the concerns

We're also partnering with Xcel Energy to get access to their wildfire cameras.

The municipalization was about 2 to three million a year. About 10 times that amount leaving our community every year in the monopolies profits.

to terminate the electric franchise agreement with the public service company of Colorado and the city of Boulder

And so the community group is gathering signatures to put an item to exercise or opt out of our franchise agreement.

Alo submitted a cample a cable franchise agreement application on February 18th, and the parties have negotiated an agreement

So, so in January, the city entered into a 20-year agreement with Ella to lease the city's dark uh fiber backbone

A brief reminder of what a cable franchise agreement is. Federal law allows local governments to require a franchise agreement

we did not discuss one of the sort of elephants in the room when we entered into the franchise agreement

the oversight team is responsible for the implementation of the programs and projects and it's comprised of city and Excel staff

and energy partnership agreement that really is intended to outline a set of shared priorities

as you may recall as we uh re-entered into our franchise agreement with Excel we got some catchup money for undergrounding

the structure of the franchise agreement. Those things around like how we work in public right aways

you talked about emission goals and things and switching over to renewable energy

It's really a contractual agreement that a city has with their utility provider.

now we have Regional change through excel's um service territory in Colorado that is driving electricity grid emissions

I asking the council to schedule a study session and subsequent Council meetings focused on the franchise agreement with Excel

I'm at a loss to find any amount of pollution reduction as a direct and sole consequence of the partnership agreement

in November of 2020 Boulder voters approved a franchise agreement and partnership agreement with Excel the partnership agreement called

Obviously it was the ballot measure at which we moved away from municipalization to the partnership with excel energy.

the partnership agreement has been ineffective in moving Boulder towards achieving its climate goals

it has been over three years since the city entered into a franchise agreement with Excel that included a partnership agreement

voters also approved a partnership between the city and Excel to make our grid cleaner and more resilient

The first was to our Excel energy partnership community advisory panel at the beginning of February

The success that that was has been realized from the municipalization effort in terms of really creating that state wide dialogue

We were very thoughtful. When we created the partnership agreement that today give ourselves the ability to opt out of the agreement

so today I just want to give a quick overview of the partnership and the work that we're doing collectively

compared to the 6.9 uh million tons that we established in the in the franchise agreement

entering into the voter approved energy partnership agreement along with the franchise

our partnership with excel energy. This was our our new partnership.

So as part of the Excel partnership. They have requirements codified within the partnership agreement

has EXL done enough to reduce carbon emissions or should we resume municipalization

allowing for a negotiated settlement in the summer of 2020 which the voters approved that fall

whether the city would take over the EXL Energy electric distribution Network

Comcast has a cable franchise agreement with the city that requires them to run cable infrastructure to nearly all the homes in the city

unlike the municipalization we had to make a decision and then figure out where we were getting our power from right so that was a choice point

Do you have any questions about this partnership agreement.

I personally, don't think it's a coincidence that these rate increases, really started hitting after November 2020, when we went into a franchise agreement

taken advantage of some of the funds we've got with our new excel franchise agreement

excel never refute never even threatened to refuse to pay the tax during the 10 years of municipalization

with respect to municipalization if we found xl to be an entirely unsatisfactory partner and wanted to take one of those off ramps

it's unclear how much if any greenhouse gases have been reduced as the sole direct result of this partnership agreement

i wanted to talk a bit about the cap tax and the boulder excel partnership agreement

really the partnership agreement envisioned um this integrated structure that starts with an executive team

the franchise agreements typically move pretty expeditiously through the Pu process

related to the actual execution of of the franchise and and some of the core pieces we put into into place

when you wanted a franchise agreement with Excel what has changed in your minds

was halted when the community voted in favor of a new settlement agreement

Project Lead on the city's climate municipalization efforts and subsequent partnership with the Public Service Company

guided the city's electric utility effort Excel franchise and settlement agreements with Public Service Company

they also approved a new partnership between the city and excel energy the partnership agreement seeks to make significant progress

it's an item we have on our list in our energy partnership agreement to evaluate

just as we had committed to in our energy partnership agreement to make that filing before march 31

we're now part of the excel franchise and as a result i think we really need to listen

we pushed Excel to go far further than they would have

it's a little bit out of sight out of mind uh since we've stopped the municipalization process

if we determine that continuing with the partnership is no longer in the best interest of the community

at this point our armeni team has been focused on a handful of activities really over the past couple of months since the november vote

voters approved a new settlement agreement really signaling the community's desire to pause municipalization for now and instead focus on partnering with excel

the city of boulder and xcel energy are seeking a representative group of community members to serve on the first energy partnership advisory panel

as you're working to implement this um new agreement to include on ongoing transparent community engagement

with the settlement agreement between excel and the city and the approval of the franchise agreement by the voters

So the settlement agreement and it has several parts. First of all, the settlement agreement is the franchise agreement.

in the energy partnership agreement, there's discussion about bridging the gap between excels be five to 70% renewable energy

the projects that are identified right now and attachments. A and B to the to the partnership agreement.

city manager candidates need to be in alignment with franchise agreement and partnership guiding principles and goals

city which is the franchise agreement with Excel and the tax to support um the projects that will be part of that

I seems like the environmental advisory board ought to be part of the discussions with Excel and advising

in terms of what kinds of projects that Excel might do with us because if you've read the partnership agreement

I was interested in the excel franchise agreement

with the issued 2C franchise agreement with Excel that path will be difficult to follow

whatever the outcome of this thing I'm not going to go shouting in the street when municipalization

I hold the people that that approved that that uh approve a municipalization accountable

the lack of financial analysis of the proposed Excel partnership agreement and determining how it will financially affect

the city budget is not affected by the presence or absence of a franchise agreement proposed in ballot issue 2C

all we know is that we are making a minimum of A2 billion commitment over the next 20 years

one is the utility occupation tax which basically goes away if we approve the franchise agreement

some of the key issues we can use the excel franchise agreement as an example i would hope that we would feel

franchise agreement with Excel U 3i is the settlement agreement which was attached as part of the materials last week

I would like to have you reconsider the your intentions with the muni effort uh breaking with Excel and supporting the municipalization

BUT THAT'S IN THE SETTLEMENT AGREEMENT AND NOT IN THE FRANCHISE AGREEMENT

ADDITIONALLY WE'VE IDENTIFIED SOME BEADING PROJECTS AS I NOTED THE PARTNERSHIP AGREEMENTS

THE GOAL OF THE PARTNERSHIP AGREEMENT REALLY ARE HAVE TRIED TO ESTABLISH BOTH QUALITATIVE AND QUANTITATIVE GOALS.

getting a franchise agreement with Excel is not an emergency Boulder can do better

in my view if a franchise is approved both of those taxes will go away

anything they do under this new effort including exotic things like hydrogen generation and storage is going to cost a bunch of money

I don't think that we would have the package in front of us had we not pursued municipalization

in partnership agreement where we talk about the um governance of how we're going to work together

members of City staff have been tasked with participating in A hurried negotiation with Excel

the extraordinarily complex issue of returning to franchise under Excel this is not urgent without a franchise agreement

any long-term agreement will hamstring the city from accepting a better deal as competition is coming into colorado

i urge you to hit the pause button and not proceed with deciding whether or not to negotiate a long-term franchise agreement with excellent energy

comments about the franchise uh other agreements that we should have with engage in with excel

I have one quick question in regards to the right to terminate franchise, could the community do that at any time

A franchise agreement is subject to vote or approval under our city charter

When that last franchise agreement was not renewed in 2010 financial support for underground in the area lines ended

Excel took home 23 million in Profit just last year and it has profited millions each previous year

if Council wishes to consider any potential franchise agreement that needs to go on the ballot

strike an arrangement with xcel energy um that includes a franchise agreement that franchise would have to be voted on

Excel proposed the wind deal in exchange for a franchise but our finance department said we could not afford it

IF WE NEGOTIATED SUCCESSFULLY AND ENTER INTO A FRANCHISE AGREEMENT WITH XL THAT WILL NEED TO GO ON THE BALLOT

WE'VE ALWAYS KEPT OUR OPTIONS OPEN INCLUDING PARTNERING WITH EXCEL AND AS YOU NOTED

this is excel's after tax profits from Boulder in the same time

assumed Excel would Finance its own expenses for Boulders municipalization

compared to the policy pathway of sticking with Xcel Energy where the decisions of our energy system are largely determined

Xcel Energy has been making progress but we need to move much much faster than they are willing to go

many of you know that XL is making progress but there's still way over 50% fossil fuels 2018 it was 73%

one way to mitigate or to avoid stranded costs would be for us to continue to purchase power from Xcel Energy

we made an offer to Excel for 94 million to purchase that system

so part of the conversation that we need to have is as we look at that Delta or what Xcel Energy is doing

the boulder district court said that we had to go to the Public Utilities Commission and have them approve

the price is considerably lower than those prices what we would have to pay if we were purchasing from Xcel

with that said i will state for the record that in paragraph three of this settlement agreement that i think

this would be part of a settlement that the city entered into with excel to settle a lawsuit

only a few short weeks ago you approved a process to acquire Xcel

if Excel we're gonna use those electric conduits would they allow us to be that close to their electric lines

if we remain with Excel typically what we would be installing would be a couple of six inch conduits

because we're still working on our contracts with Xcel Energy those contracts will be provided to the council on May 22nd as you know

it also concerns me that Excel will actually trust the city if this city does not come forward

the city will have completed the PUC transfer and separation case that we are presently litigating

it was originally passed in 2010 it was passed to replace the franchise fee that we received from Xcel Energy

clearly a franchise agreement should and can be done after we've kind

no matter which option we took municipalization or um negotiation and um with Excel

Boulder might want to negotiate an arrangement with Excel that's similar to minneapolis's clean energy partnership agreement