United Power is pleased to announce the hiring of Jonathan Aust as the cooperative’s Vice President of Energy Resource Planning.

“Jonathan brings a wealth of experience and expertise to this key position,” stated Dean Hubbuck, Senior Vice President and Chief Energy Resource Officer. “Since United Power left its single wholesale power provider in 2024, it is vital to have the right talent on our team to oversee this essential function. Jonathan not only has outstanding credentials for this role, but he is also familiar with the local energy delivery market.”

Aust most recently served as Vice President of Power Operations for the Western Area Power Administration (WAPA). In this role he led a team of more than 80 employees to support power operations responsible for supporting a seven-state footprint and two balancing authorities, delivering power to energy providers across the footprint. Prior to that, he served as Vice President of Information Technology for SCADA/EMS, or supervisory control and data acquisition and energy management system, supporting WAPA’s control centers across a 15-state area.

Aust has served in leadership for a variety of key industry committees, including several representing the Western Electricity Coordinating Council (WECC). He was honored in 2022 with WECC’s Outstanding Contributor Award.

“Energy resource planning is a critical area for this cooperative,” said Mark A. Gabriel, United Power President and CEO. “As we continue to build our energy portfolio, it is vital that we have the right talent on our leadership team. Jonathan will be able to help us build out and maintain our portfolio, and his deep understanding of the energy markets will help us continue to make the right investments on behalf of the cooperative’s members.”

Updated Roadmap is Collective Vision to Successfully Deliver on Co-op’s Mission

United Power debuted its landmark action plan for preparing and adapting to industry changes nearly three years ago as it was about to enter new territory as an independent electric utility. Our Cooperative Roadmap (Roadmap) was a coordinated effort by co-op staff to identify a collective vision to guide the utility’s future decisions. The action plan is ever-evolving, proactively responding to anticipated shifts in the electric industry, and ensures United Power maintains its competitive advantage as an industry leader in power supply innovation, system performance, and member satisfaction. 

It was the strategic direction provided in the Roadmap’s first iteration that helped United Power secure a diverse portfolio of power supply agreements to meet the cooperative’s needs as it grows over the next several years. These agreements have already reduced the cooperative’s greenhouse gas emissions by 26% since May. United Power’s commitment to reducing emissions was a driving factor in obtaining nearly $262 million through the Empowering Rural America (New ERA) Program to support its clean energy transition. The Roadmap was also pivotal in providing investor confidence to help finance the move toward independence, deploying an innovative battery energy storage system to mitigate peak costs, and breaking ground on a natural gas plant to ensure resource adequacy and flexibility. 

Five guiding principles were identified to help the cooperative define, implement, and evaluate the Roadmap’s focus areas:

• Safety. Prioritize safety in every decision and action. Safety is reflected in every aspect of United Power’s operations by fostering a culture of transparency, trust, and teamwork.
• Reliability. Striving to deliver high-quality, uninterrupted service to members through the design, operation, protection, and maintenance of a robust and resilient electric distribution system. 
• Affordability. Commitment to securing fair and competitive wholesale rates, managing costs, and responsibly allocating those costs across the membership with stable and transparent rate options.
• Flexibility. Demonstrate maximum agility and adaptiveness through forward-looking plans, versatile and innovative programs and business models, and diverse power supply options as the cooperative responds to changes in its environment and the needs of members and communities.
• Responsibility. Act ethically, sustainably, and in the best interest of members and communities as the cooperative manages operations and secures resources. 

The four strategic focus areas identified in the first version of the Roadmap remain relatively the same in the updated Roadmap, stretching across all the core functions of the cooperative, including power supply; system reliability and resiliency; data safety and security; and member programs and community engagement. 

Empower and Engage with Members and Communities

Electric cooperatives are owned by the members they serve, which means the members are not just consumers but stakeholders in the cooperative’s success. 

Members can vote for who represents them on the United Power Board of Directors through the annual Director Election, but the cooperative also gives back to the community in many ways.

United Power is a community partner, helping them establish their goals and visions. This includes understanding the unique needs and challenges of the communities and businesses the cooperative serves. The co-op supports the economic vitality of local communities through collaboration with local leaders and economic development organizations on growth initiatives and assists businesses with energy advice and expertise to help them meet legislative and regulatory targets. 

Provide Flexible, Affordable, Responsible Power and Services

As the needs of the distribution system have increased, so has the need for United Power to evolve and optimize the supply of power and services to its members.

Becoming an independent electric utility provided United Power with more flexibility over its power supply options. The cooperative added more than 110 MW of battery energy storage to its distribution system last year and broke ground on an innovative gas peaking plant for an additional 160 MW of resource adequacy. The cooperative continues to pursue cost efficient power supply contracts while limiting greenhouse gas emissions.

Continuously Optimize the Electric Distribution System

The optimization of the electric distribution system is paramount as the cooperative confronts increasing demands and complexities driven by rapid electrification, the integration of distributed energy resources, and the evolving expectation of members.

United Power has experienced consecutive years of record-breaking reliability, ranking among the best electric utilities in the country. The cooperative’s strategic maintenance plan and innovative system design continue to provide positive results and demonstrate remarkable success. 

Achieve and Maintain Business Agility and Resilience

Business agility and resilience are key investments of United Power’s strategic and operational plans. 

Advancing technologies play a critical role in how United Power responds to and prevents outages. The cooperative is working to replace its distributed energy resource management system by early 2026 to better manage system operations and plans to roll out new tools to better manage materials and projects. 

Our Cooperative Roadmap, along with news and updates about its implementation, can be found here.

Alice: “Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?”
Cheshire Cat: “That depends a good deal on where you want to get to.” 

This quote from Alice and the Cheshire Cat in Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland is often paraphrased, “If you don’t know where you are going, then any road will get you there.” It speaks to the fact that a lack of direction can create challenges instead of opportunities and simply reinforces the status quo.

Having strategic direction, especially in times of significant societal and technological change, is critical. That is why the amazing team at United Power, supported by your Board of Directors, has unveiled the second version of Our Cooperative Roadmap (Roadmap). This document gives the co-op its direction and helps us screen activities in — as well as out.

The Roadmap v1.0 led us to where we are today. We have reduced our greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by more than 26% since May 1 and successfully raised $700 million to evolve as an independent utility and meet the needs of our communities and more than 113,000 members. The Roadmap helped us obtain $261 million through the Empowering Rural America (New ERA) Program to support the transition to a cleaner energy supply and hyper-localize our resources. It clarified our technology investments, how we interact with members, and our role in supporting our communities.

Much has changed nearly three years after we unveiled the initial Roadmap. The western United States is edging closer to a power market and new power sources have come online. More members are adding solar panels and purchasing electric vehicles. But much has also remained the same, such as Colorado’s goal of 80% reduction in GHG emissions over 2005 levels by 2030 — a goal we will meet or exceed by helping members such as those in the oil and gas industry achieve their targets simply by electrifying the production facilities.

The Roadmap v2.0 maintains its focus on four critical areas that lie at the heart of what we do as a member-owned electric cooperative:

• Empower and Engage with Members and Communities. This critical element ties directly to United Power’s Community Benefit Plan through New ERA. Our dedicated focus on supporting communities and members made creating the benefit plan a simple task for our team.
• Provide Flexible, Affordable, Responsible Power and Services. United Power’s hyperlocalization strategy has resulted in significant deployment of battery energy storage systems, with more than 110 MWs spread across nine substations. It already proved valuable during last summer’s peak. This industry-leading deployment means we can benefit from times when power prices are low, using the stored energy when demand (and prices) are high.
• Continuously Optimize the Electric Distribution System. As we move toward becoming a distribution system operator (DSO), focusing on local generation and control, our system investments are made with your future needs in mind. We installed a new outage management system in 2024 that, coupled with our advanced metering infrastructure, gives us better real-time operational data.
• Achieve and Maintain Business Agility and Resilience. We will be replacing our distributed energy resource management system (DERMS) in 2025 to better manage system operations, and are rolling out a new asset management tool to improve our response times and better manage material and projects.

Underpinning Our Cooperative Roadmap are the amazing women and men of United Power and the foundational responsibilities they bring to running your cooperative every day.

Lewis Carroll’s words resonate for me when he said, “One of the deep secrets of life is that all that is really worth doing is what we do for others.” It sure sounds so to me.

As always, feel free to reach out to me with your questions, comments, and concerns.