Harold Smethills has co-authored an excellent op-ed in today’s Gazette. Our electrical grid – and the need for access to affordable, abundant, sustainable supplies of energy – gets far too little attention. The left seems to believe that we can endlessly add limiting regulation, and price increases with little or no effect on business and individual consumers. I think this op-ed does an excellent job of highlighting the dilemma we face in Colorado, but it’s really a critical national problem, too. As the authors point out, sound environmental and energy policy are not mutually exclusive. You really can have both simultaneously.
The failure to expand to anticipated energy needs will hit all economic sectors, but some will feel it more sharply. Construction, retail, professional services, and utilities each depend uniquely on robust energy access.
This is not simply a matter of expansion for its own sake. Colorado, like the whole world, is undergoing a pivotal technological and cultural transition in the mid-2020s that will dictate its economic fortunes for the next several decades.
Policies have already taken a toll: Since 2009, environmental and emission-reduction mandates have cost Colorado $18.3 billion in GDP, $13.8 billion in personal income, and $32 billion in output. Since 2021 alone, households and businesses have paid $791 million more for electricity because of policy choices made in recent years.