Our products and services differ based on state. Please select your state (or the state you're interested in) from the list to the left.
Why do our products and services differ based on state? Because our business is regulated by state. We have regulated operations in eight Western and Midwestern states. The different regulatory body for each state we serve determines what products and services we deliver in that state.
Colorado Wind Power
Colorado Wind Power
We continue to grow our use of wind power in Colorado
We built Colorado's first commercial wind farm in the late 1990s, the 32-megawatt Ponnequin Wind Farm in northern Colorado. Since then, we have grown our use of wind power in Colorado to about 2,200 megawatts.
2012 was a significant year for the addition of wind energy. We began purchasing about 400 megawatts from NextEra Energy Resources' Limon I and II Wind Energy Centers. The twin 200-megawatt projects now supply some of the lowest cost wind energy on our system.
Colorado has excellent wind resources, and we invested early, which helps to keep our wind energy costs low. Managing wind power on the electric system can be challenging because it is notoriously difficult to predict. We are working to improve wind forecasting and the integration onto our system. One early morning hour in April 2012, we recorded a system peak with 57 percent of the electricity on our Colorado system coming from wind energy.
| XCEL ENERGY - COLORADO WIND POWER | |||
| Facility | Location | Capacity | In-service Date |
| Ponnequin | Weld County (just south of the Wyoming border) | 32 MW | 1998 |
| Foot Creek III | Wyoming | 25 MW | 1999 |
| Ridgecrest | Peetz, Colo. | 30 MW | 2001 |
| Colorado Green | Lamar, Colo. | 162 MW | 2004 |
| Spring Canyon | Peetz, Colo. | 60 MW | 2006 |
| Cedar Creek | Grover, Colo. | 300 MW | 2007 |
| Logan Wind | Peetz, Colo. | 201 MW | 2007 |
| Peetz Table | Peetz, Colo. | 200 MW | 2007 |
| Twin Buttes | Lamar, Colo. | 75 MW | 2007 |
| Northern Colorado Wind | Peetz, Colo. | 174 MW | 2009 |
| NREL/National Wind Testing Center | Golden, Colo. | 9 MW | 2010 |
| Cedar Creek II | Weld County, Colo. | 251 MW | 2011 |
| Cedar Point Wind | Lincoln & Elbert Counties, Colo. | 252 MW | 2011 |
| Limon Wind I | Lincoln & Elbert Counties, Colo. | 200 MW | 2012 |
| Limon Wind II | Lincoln County, Colo. | 200 MW | 2012 |
Read More About Wind Energy
Colorado Wind Energy News
Useful wind power information
- American Wind Energy Association
- National Renewable Energy Laboratory
- Energy Classroom
- Grand Meadow Wind Farm Facts
- Nobles Wind Farm Facts
- Ponnequin Wind Farm Facts
- Wind-to-Battery Project Fact Sheet
- Wind-to-Battery Project Results News Release
- Sign Up for Windsource (residential)
- Sign up for Windsource (business)
