Colorado lawmakers are currently deliberating Senate Bill 26-22, a proposal by Colorado Springs Utilities (CSU) to give them permission to “extend the deadline to find an affordable and reliable replacement power supply” for its Ray Nixon coal-powered plant. CSU wants to extend the deadline to 2040, instead of retiring it by the end of 2029, as promised.

In 2020, when I was on the Utility Board and City Council, we proposed to State officials, after much due diligence, to stop burning coal at Nixon in 2029. This was part of a compromise that allowed CSU to avoid having to install expensive new air pollution controls at Nixon to comply with Regional clean air standards.

What I learned then was that the Nixon coal plant was one of the largest air polluters in Colorado. In 2024 alone, Nixon emitted more than 1.2 million tons of carbon dioxide (CO2). To put that into perspective, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimates that Nixon emits as much

CO2 annually as driving approximately one million gas-powered vehicles for an entire year.

This month, The American Lung Association released the 27th annual “State of the Air” report that grades counties’ air quality in terms of unhealthy levels of ground-level ozone air pollution (also known as smog). El Paso County received an F for ozone pollution because of many dozens of days every year where we have exceeded federal safety standards.

In addition to Nixon, many other sources of air pollution are increasingly affecting our local air quality and health and can’t be ignored when making this decision. There has been a severe lack of transportation infrastructure monies available since TABOR passed in Colorado Springs in 1990 and Statewide in 1992. As a result, traffic congestion is quite common in the Region, especially with population growth. Because of how spread-out our region’s housing has become, it is unlikely that the population concentration needed to have a well-used public transit system will ever be achieved to help mitigate that congestion. Currently, 60% of local residents drive higher-polluting SUVs and Pickup Trucks, and there is virtually no local enforcement of extra-polluting and altered vehicle tailpipes. Because

of the chronic lack of park funding locally, there isn’t a good system in place of connected off-road trails and greenways like our neighbors in the North Front Range have constructed. In other words, there aren’t enough safe alternative bicycle and motorized bicycle transportation opportunities for locals to ride places instead of driving. Another culprit are the 10-15 million tourists who come to our Region every year in their often poorly tuned (for our altitude), vehicles. Then there is also quite a bit of North Front Range air pollution that crosses over the Palmer Divide when Northern winds are prevalent. And finally, because we have been having the hottest and driest years on record and there has been severely inadequate funding for wildfire mitigation throughout the West, air-polluting wildfires sending plumes our way will certainly become increasingly more common.

The American Lung Association reports that El Paso County currently has 79,938 children and adults with asthma, 29,546 people with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) and 40,513 with cardiovascular disease. In other words,150,000 or so residents are very vulnerable to increased air pollution. In addition, 111,405 older adults live in our region, many of whom are on oxygen due to our altitude. In other words, if Nixon keeps burning coal for another 11 years (without the necessary pollution controls installed that were waived), residents living with chronic health conditions will face increased impacts like hospitalization, having to stay home from work or school, and possibly an increased risk of death.

CSU claims their motive is to save ratepayers money. But what about the money residents will have to spend on additional hospitalizations, emergency room and doctor’s visits, missing work, or having to be on oxygen, if Nixon keeps burning coal for an additional 11 years? The EPA estimates that air pollution from the Ray Nixon coal unit causes $35 to $46 million in additional healthcare costs each year it continues to burn coal. To multiply that by 11 years, that equals $440 million more dollars of increased health costs for our Region’s residents. There must be a better solution than extending coal burning at Nixon.

Richard Skorman is a former four-term Colorado Springs City Council Member, Vice Mayor and 55-year Colorado Springs resident.