One Ward business owner is calling Xcel Energy “tone deaf” for its Tuesday social media message thanking its customers who lost power for their understanding while the utility turned the lights back on after last week’s windstorm. She is among the 182 still in the dark north of Nederland almost a week later.
In some communities north of Nederland, like Ward and Allenspark, 182 Xcel customers have been without power since 2:33 p.m. Wednesday, according to the utility’s outage map. As of about 12:30 p.m. Tuesday, the neighborhood’s residents were expected to be able to turn their lights on again at about 1:30 p.m.
However, that estimate has been pushed back at least once.
“We would like to thank you for your patience and support as we took steps to protect the safety of our communities and decrease the risk of wildfire over the past few days,” the utility wrote in a social media post. “We know being without power is disruptive and can be frustrating, so we take the decision to implement a Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS) very seriously.”
For some Xcel customers without power, that message felt ill-timed, or “tone deaf,” as the co-owner of Ward’s Hotel Columbia, Masyn Moyer, put it. Moyer lives in the Newmarket Street hotel, too, and said the Xcel’s estimated power restoration time for her home has been pushed back numerous times.
Moyer has owned the hotel for about a year, but is a veteran of living in the mountains. Being without power this long is a challenge, she said, and some people in small towns really struggle with the loss of power and the ability to make phone calls.
“Who’s expecting an 8-day outage?” Moyer, who said she knew people as far as Allenspark without power, asked. “That [message] felt a little like a kick in the teeth.”
Wind is nothing new in Ward, Moyer said. Strong gusts may be uncommon for Boulder or Longmont, but the small town is used to 50, 60, 70 mph gusts, so the planned power shutoff didn’t quite feel like it was tailored to Ward’s needs, she said.
Moyer said Ward has some seniors who use oxygen tanks that can’t contact authorities in the event of an emergency, and Ward has some small business owners who could lose perishable goods during an already-slow season for the small mountain community. She worries, too, about how children are feeling without Christmas lights so close to the holiday.
“It’s kind of ridiculous in this day and age to be this long,” Moyer said of the outage, also asking why there aren’t more forward-thinking energy solutions for communities like hers. “We know how to deal with things, but damn. Damn.”
What did you think of Xcel’s planned power outages? Colorado utility regulators want to know.
The outage north of Nederland is one of the largest in Colorado as of Tuesday afternoon, according to Xcel.
The outages across Boulder County started as planned shutoffs on Wednesday, aiming to limit the risk of rapid wildfire spread amid a windstorm. That windstorm brought gusts over 100 mph and took out power for as many as 100,000 people across Colorado.
Xcel officials had not responded to questions from the Daily Camera as of 1 p.m. Tuesday.
This is a developing story and may be updated.