United Power Expanded Hyper-Local Energy Strategy in 2025

The Power of Local moves United Power to think of the best way to serve members. That includes identifying best energy practices and meaningful engagement opportunities with the cooperative’s local communities. 

Nearly four years ago, as United Power was preparing to exit its former wholesale power contract, staff worked together to create an action plan to serve as its guide. Our Cooperative Roadmap (Roadmap) was the result of collaborative work sessions that leveraged the collective knowledge and experience of employees across the co-op to chart a path forward that addressed uncertainty in the industry and the energy needs of the members now and into the future. The Roadmap provided strategic direction on critical decisions, including power supply and infrastructure planning for the long-term health and resiliency of the distribution system and cooperative as a whole.

Created as a document that would evolve with the co-op and changes in the industry, United Power unveiled its second version last year. Our Cooperative Roadmap 2.0 added more emphasis on a hyper-local energy strategy that was already in process with the installation of several battery energy storage systems (BESS) throughout the cooperative’s service territory. 

What is Hyper-Localization?

One of the biggest question marks electric utilities face is access to sufficient transmission capacity, since many rely on distant power generation sources. Building new transmission and updating existing infrastructure will require many years and trillions of dollars in financing nationwide. Even if financing, permitting, and supply chain hurdles can be cleared, demand is increasing at a historic pace, faster than new transmission can be built. 

Hyper-localization is the strategy of locating generation and storage resources locally, closer to where power is consumed. Local power bypasses expensive and congested transmission, benefits the distribution system, and provides an added financial incentive for local communities through tax dollars and job opportunities. 

United Power expanded its commitment to hyper-localization in 2025 with the completion of a new natural gas peaking plant and the announcement of several new projects that will come on line in the next few years. 

The Mountain Peak Power plant is a 162 megawatt (MW) natural gas plant located adjacent to a United Power substation and BESS outside Keenesburg. Its location also takes advantage of close proximity to natural gas sources, which reduces delivery costs and ensures availability. The plant was designed and constructed in partnership with Kindle Energy and completed from conception to operation in less than two years, with construction completed in less than a year after the project broke ground. The addition of this local resource provides an economical source of power when energy demand is high. 

The cooperative also announced a power purchase agreement with Alliance Energy Group in 2025 for the 70 MW output of its Brush II natural gas project in Brush, Colorado. Natural gas generation balances and complements renewable resources in United Power’s energy mix. 

Two new local solar projects totaling 350 MW were also announced last year. 

Silicon Ranch and United Power are partnering on their fifth — and largest — utility-scale solar project, located in Adams County northeast of Byers. Silicon Ranch will be responsible for the operation and maintenance of the facility, and the cooperative will purchase its 150 MW of solar generation output. The new project joins a portfolio including the Fort Lupton (13 MW), Mavericks (6.5 MW), Platteville (16 MW), and Rattlesnake (6 MW) solar farms already in operation. 

The second solar project, Fortress, will be a hybrid facility combining 200 MW of solar generation with 200 MW (800 megawatt-hours) of battery energy storage. Aypa Power will manage the innovative project, also located near Brush. It is scheduled to begin operation in 2027. 

United Power serves several of the fastest growing communities in Colorado and expects its system demand to continue increasing into the future. The cooperative is prioritizing its hyper-localization strategy for new energy projects that benefit the co-op and its members. 

Caring for Community

Hyper-localization may be a term that describes the cooperative’s energy strategy, but United Power also has a hyper-local presence in the communities it serves, supporting events, sponsoring fairs and festivals, recognizing student achievements, and more.

The cooperative annually awards thousands of dollars in scholarships to local students pursuing postsecondary educational opportunities. Keeping the lights on is difficult work that requires highly skilled and trained professional lineworkers. However, the industry is facing a workforce shortage, with nearly 45% of experienced lineworkers projected to retire within the next decade. That is why the cooperative awards lineworker scholarships to advance the profession. Two $7,500 scholarships were awarded in December for students who are enrolled in a qualified program in 2026.

Employees also gave back to local nonprofits in recognition of National Co-op Month in October. More than 90 employees volunteered for eight service projects at nonprofits located throughout the service territory. Their participation was a visible demonstration of the co-op’s core principle of concern for the community, and a reminder that a spirit of service is important for thriving communities.

Occasionally, United Power extends support beyond its borders to help meet the needs of families in disadvantaged areas. This past year, lineworkers returned to the Navajo Nation to provide power to those families for the second year. The cooperative also provided supplies and equipment for projects in July and October.

The Power of Local is expressed in everything United Power does, from pursuing local energy solutions to empowering and championing local communities. But it is also expressed in the co-op’s members, who endeavor to bring their visions for their communities to life through tireless commitment and sacrifice. That is The Power of Local. 

This is the time of year when we have the opportunity to look back as well as forward, and reflect on changes we have made or will make.

At United Power, we continue to evolve to meet the needs of our members, the requirements imposed on the utility, and the increasing demand for electricity from society in general. The cooperative’s growth necessitated many changes and, following Our Cooperative Roadmap, the amazing women and men in the organization have stepped up in a myriad ways.

I generally think of United Power’s evolution in three broad categories — the changes necessary due to our well-founded decision to leave our former power supplier, the changes required to meet state and federal mandates, and those driven by our growth. The majority of the changes are in the latter two categories. We topped 117,000 electric meters in early December and face the state mandate to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions 80% by 2030 (compared to 2005 levels). This is a particular challenge for United Power due to the continued growth in our service territory. 

Our job is to keep the lights on for the communities we serve. To do so, we added a wide range of generating resources to our mix. We hit a record peak of 680 MW this past summer, serving the load with a broad combination of resources including gas, solar, storage, hydro, and wind, which works to offset risk.

Looking back on 2025, we reached several major milestones:

• We opened Mountain Peak Power, a state-of-the-art natural gas plant, which will also be able to burn hydrogen when that becomes commercially available. The plant significantly changed — and lowered — our risk profile, while adding robustness and flexibility. Most importantly, it allows us to hedge natural gas during cold winter and hot summer months instead of relying on market purchases that can spike at those times.
• We signed a contract for 200 MW of solar backed by 200 MW of storage that will come on line in 2027 to replace expiring contracts. United Power already has more than 119 MW of batteries distributed across nine substations being deployed in new and different ways.
• We received finality about the exit fee from our former power supplier when the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission confirmed that United Power would receive an additional $124 million of prepaid transmission credit plus interest back over the next 40 years.

I am equally excited about what lies ahead for United Power in 2026:

• United Power will join the Southwest Power Pool (SPP) on April 1. Utilities that agreed to join the expansion of this regional transmission organization will be able to buy and sell power from the market, which will expand access to more renewables needed to meet Colorado’s clean energy requirements.
• We are implementing a new distributed energy resource management system during the first quarter of the year as we begin the next phase toward becoming a distribution system operator. This change will allow better member interactions and increase the options for load control and management. Through the SPP, we will be able to bundle grid edge resources to sell into the market. 

I would be remiss if I did not address the recent rate increase, which we recognize has been painful for many in our community. We have tried to avoid increases during my five-year tenure. While our cost of energy has gone down, power delivery costs and supply chain expenses along with insurance and property taxes continue to increase. We will be developing a 3-5 year rate strategy that smooths the pattern of future increases, and will survey members during first quarter of this year about the strategy. I urge you to let your voices be heard.

As always, please feel free to reach out with any comments or questions.

Reliability Outperforms National Averages Year-Over-Year

Members expect consistently reliable power from their electric utility. United Power has maintained a standard of excellence in system performance, delivering results that far exceed the national average year-over-year. The cooperative has continued to meet this standard while it navigated a power supply transition last year and is incorporating new, innovative projects that source and store power locally. 

The cooperative’s exit from its wholesale power contract in May of 2024 meant bringing on new contracts from a mix of traditional and sustainable resources into the distribution system. Aside from celebrating United Power’s energy independence, the switch was successfully executed without any power disruptions, ensuring members can count on the cooperative to maintain its standards for reliability and resiliency across the distribution system.

United Power has collected 18 months of data since the transition, demonstrating consistent system reliability.

Measuring Reliability, By the Numbers

Electric utilities use a variety of key performance indicators to measure how effectively and efficiently their systems are operating. The most common indicator is known as the System Average Interruption Duration Index, or SAIDI. United Power also tracks the System Average Interruption Frequency Index, or SAIFI. These indicators are among the many used by utilities to analyze system performance and calculate outage expectations for an average member. 

SAIDI is the measurement of cumulative outage time (in minutes) an average member would expect to experience over the course of a year. The national average across all electric utilities was 131 minutes in 2024 and nearly 240 minutes for cooperatives, according to the Energy Information Administration (EIA). United Power’s SAIDI score has stayed below 80 minutes each of the past three years and is just above 60 minutes through September of this year.

SAIFI measures the total number of outages an average member would expect to experience over the course of a year (frequency of outages experienced). United Power’s score of 0.90 in 2024 means the average meter experienced fewer than one outage throughout the year, again exceeding the national average across all electric utilities (1.07) and other cooperatives (1.61), per the EIA. Put another way, most United Power members were unlikely to experience more than one outage last year, and many did not experience an outage at all. 

Another performance indicator used by utilities measures the system’s overall availability rate. The co-op’s three-year availability rate was between 98.8% and 99.9%. 

“Our system’s performance is due to the great effort of our engineering and operations teams,” said Mark A. Gabriel, United Power’s President and CEO. “They are responsible for reviewing and interpreting data and developing strategies to improve the system. We are setting the standard for other utilities while meeting our members’ expectations.”

Building a Better System

United Power’s approach to maximizing system performance utilizes a comprehensive combination of design practices, proactive maintenance projects, and extensive integration of automated and smart field devices. 

Outages are an intrinsic reality for electric utilities. United Power can mitigate them, but cannot guarantee they will not happen. Mitigation begins with building the system so that outages are recognized earlier, impact fewer members, and are restored quickly — and more importantly, safely. The cooperative designs the system with these steps in mind. 

One of the ways this is accomplished is known as a “redundancy.” This essentially means that power can be rerouted from an alternate source to restore members during an outage while crews are investigating the cause or working on repairs. Most members are on a redundant system, which is part of why United Power’s average restoration times are also among the best in the country. 

Another design strategy is “sectionalizing.” This means that when a fault results in an outage, depending on where it is located down the line, it may affect fewer members. Devices are installed in sections throughout the distribution system to limit outage impact. 

United Power also deploys automated devices that collect system data. That information can help locate and clear faults to minimize outages and reduce restoration times or identify infrastructure that is not performing optimally and needs to be repaired. This data has been helpful in the cooperative’s maintenance plan, which proactively targets the worst-performing sections of the system to improve reliability and increase resiliency. 

United Power outperforms other electric utilities across the various metrics used to evaluate system performance, but the cooperative regularly reviews emerging strategies and innovative technologies that can further improve reliability. Delivering safe and reliable power is the co-op’s core responsibility to members. You can be sure it is not taken lightly.