Pueblo Fights Back as Colorado’s Coal Plants Close and Jobs Disappear

By Marianne Goodland | Colorado Politics

As Colorado darts toward a future powered by “clean” energy, a battle is brewing in Pueblo, where coal closures, union jobs and lost tax revenue collide with a community demanding a solution as its power plants are a primary target for a shutdown.

Between 2025 and 2031, six more coal-fired power plants in Colorado are scheduled to be shut down or converted to another energy source, such as natural gas.

With more than 800 jobs to be affected, another three plants are on the list for future closures.

The closures are raising alarm bells, notably for the unions that count the power plant workers as members. A group has put forward an action plan called the Colorado Energy Compact, calling for a “balanced and sustainable energy policy” and a transition that is “are “clear, stable, and grounded in the realities of our grid, our workforce, and our economy.”

Besides unions and jobs, taxes paid to local communities are also a major worry, with revenue ranging from 12% of the total collected in Pueblo County to as high as 33.7% in Moffat County.

The compact is drawing together more than two dozen organizations and individual experts in energy, labor and public policy, according to Action Colorado’s Sara Blackhurst.

The plan is designed as both a tool and an accountability check for lawmakers and regulators, focusing on a state standard that, the compact maintains, should be technology-neutral and which supports a balanced mix of current and emerging technologies. The goal, the compact said, is to ensure a transition that benefits Colorado’s environmental and economic future, protects families, and sustains local economies.

The fight over Comanche plants

In Pueblo, residents are fighting back to keep the Comanche power plants open. They oppose wind or solar energy, which they claim is unreliable. 

The Comanche station just south of Pueblo is a 695-acre site with a rail system, water contracts, transmission capacity and injection, according to a report from the Pueblo Innovative Energy Solutions Advisory Committee. It includes three coal-generating units “that have provided highly-paid, family supporting jobs and tax payments of tens of millions of dollars for decades,” the report said. 

Comanche 1 closed in 2022. Comanche 2 will close in 2025. Comanche 3, which opened in 2010, will close no later than Jan. 1, 2031, about 10 years ahead of schedule. 

The controversy surrounding the Comanche power plants comes at a time when the Trump administration has withdrawn support for “clean” energy, cutting over $500 million in grants to Colorado companies and universities. Additionally, Energy Secretary Chris Wright, a Colorado native, said he wants to “unleash American energy at home and abroad.” Wright said America should focus on ensuring a wide array of cheap, abundant and sustainable energy sources that include geothermal, nuclear, oil and gas.

The campaign to save the Comanche plants suggests a major battle is brewing over the two Xcel units in Pueblo.

The Colorado Fiscal Institute, in a Sept. 2024 report, said the closure of Comanche 3 alone will cost about 77 jobs and about $31 million annually in tax revenue to the Pueblo community.

The same report said the Environmental Protection Agency’s CO-Benefits Risk Assessment tool estimated that closing Comanche 3 would result in avoided health costs benefiting Colorado between $52 million and $67 million annually, with Pueblo County specifically benefiting between $4.6 million and $5.6 million.

The report downplayed the benefits of nuclear energy as a replacement energy source and instead recommended wind and solar. 

On the opposite side, the Pueblo Innovative Energy Solutions Advisory Committee, a group initiated by Xcel Energy and made up of community leaders, has looked at potential replacements for the energy sources at Comanche 3.

The PIESAC group is led by attorney Frances Koncilja and investor Corinne Koehler; members Jerry Bellah, vice president of IBEW local 8; Sara Blackhurst of Action Colorado; Russell De Salvo, who heads the Pueblo Depot Authority; Patty Erjavec, former president of Pueblo Community College; former judge Dennis Maes; Timothy Mottet, a former president of CSU-Pueblo; Duane Nava, head of the Greater Pueblo Chamber; Jeff Shaw, president of Pueblo Economic Development; and former Pueblo County Commissioner Chris Wiseman.

The group’s report, which came out in January 2024, looked at all the impacts, noting “the Pueblo community has supported these early closures and done more to reduce emissions in the state than any other community.”

The report said the economic hit from closing Comanche 3 would total $196 million to Pueblo and result in the loss of hundreds of high-wage, career-level jobs. Pueblo would lose more than $845 million in tax revenues by 2070, the report added.

Its proposed solution: “Of all the technologies we studied, only advanced nuclear generation will make Pueblo whole and also provide a path to prosperity.”

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