Sterling Ranch residents are fed up with losing power more than 40 times. Xcel's president in Colorado answered questions at a community meeting.
LITTLETON, Colo. — Neighbors in the Sterling Ranch community in Littleton are fed up with power outages. Xcel Energy said power has been turned off in this new development 46 times. At times some customers have been without power for six hours.
On Monday, residents invited Xcel executives to a community meeting to answer questions and share solutions.
9NEWS spoke to several residents before the meeting who've had enough of the power outages. They called them "disruptive" and a "severe quality of life issue".
Neighbors said they are losing money on groceries. One woman said she had to replace an air conditioning unit after a power outage on Friday.
"The repair tech said this will happen when electrical surges overload capacitors," she wrote in an email with a $278 receipt for repairs attached to it.
A mom of three kids who wrote to 9NEWS talked about how hard the unplanned outages have been with small children.
"Also, a safety thing when our kids start school, we have no way of seeing emergency emails and cell service isn’t great here either. Sometimes when the power is out, I can’t even make a phone call so I rely on our internet. I’m about to have a new baby and so fearful for breast milk and pumping," she said.
Robert Kennedy, president of Xcel Energy's Colorado Operating Company, said residents should expect more stable service by mid- to late October. Kennedy attributed the issues to rapid growth in the area, wildfire mitigation efforts and heat straining the system.
An assessment found more than 300 defects - equipment that is at or reaching end of life as well as vegetation management needed - on the two feeders that serve Sterling Ranch. The work to make these repairs should be done in eight weeks.
Xcel is also expanding a substation which it hopes will reduce outages by 90%. The energy company is also looking at additional communication systems to find and solve outages faster.
Some residents asked if there is an opportunity to be compensated. Kennedy referred customers to a process where they can submit a claim, but he couldn't guarantee that claim would be approved.
"Our hope was that we were able to provide the information that has been requested from the community about the outages that are happening in Sterling Ranch," said Hollie Velasquez Horvath, regional vice president of Xcel. "In addition that that, it was also to educate and bring awareness to some of the different reasons for the outages, the solutions that we are doing and executing."
Many of the outages in the Sterling Ranch community are unplanned such as when Xcel activates its Enhanced Powerline Safety Settings (EPSS) to protect lives, homes and open space from the risk of wildfire. Under this program, Xcel enables more sensitive settings on powerline protective equipment when wildfire risk is elevated.
When an object strikes the line or a fault occurs, the power is shut off in less than a second. Xcel said a crew member must check the lines for damage before safely restoring power.
Sterling Ranch residents said power is shut off without warning. Velasquez Horvath said there is room for improving communication during wildfire mitigation efforts.
"We have three really smart meteorologists and a software system that plans out and forecasts weather," she said. "It is a dynamic situation, but we can plan and we should be able to show you when we do have those wildfire safety settings set."
Velasquez Horvath said areas in a wildfire risk zone make the powerlines more sensitive and the setting shows more equipment issues on an electric line. According to her, that is why the company identified more than 300 defects on the feeders that serve Sterling Ranch.
"Then you combine that with the growth in Sterling Ranch and the capacity constraints that are on these two electric lines and that is where we're showing you with needing to do upgrades to the conduit," she said.
Kennedy spent more than an hour answering questions during the meeting. He stayed after the meeting ended to talk to residents who couldn't ask a question.
