Sending Aid to Power the Navajo Nation

Miles of vacant desert land often separate homesteads in the sparsely populated territory of the Navajo Nation. The summer months are a grueling combination of temperatures exceeding 100 degrees and very little moisture. And many of the Nation’s people still endure the environment without access to electricity. 

The Light Up Navajo initiative was launched as a collaboration between the Navajo Tribal Utilities Authority (NTUA) and the American Public Power Association to bridge this gap in electrification. The initiative’s sixth project since 2019 aimed to power 175 homes in remote parts of the Nation this summer.

Four United Power lineworkers volunteered to participate in the summer project. They were dispatched to New Mexico for a week in July. The crew included Foreman Zach Reynolds, Journey Lineworkers Ted Pierce and Dillon Scroggins, and Apprentice Lineworker Isaiah Segoviano. 

“I did not know what to expect when I volunteered for this project,” said Reynolds. “It was a very humbling and eye-opening experience. It is crazy to think that we have the luxury of power every day, but we get upset and complain when the power goes out. Some of the Navajo people have lived more than 50 years without power.”

Reynolds and his crew would wake up as early as 5 a.m. to drive to the staging station before spending nearly an hour on the road to their work site. They spent the week setting poles and hanging line extensions under the hot sun. 

It was frequently a challenge to set poles because of the loose dirt embedded with small stones and rocks. Using traditional equipment to dig post holes was nearly impossible due to the conditions, and it was common for holes to collapse. 

The week ended with a larger project that included setting 40 poles to power a single residence on an isolated plot of land. Its occupants were the grandchildren of a former World War II code talker, a special unit of Marines who used their native Navajo language to create and transmit coded messages during the war. They were a crucial element in the victory. 

“He was a code talker and a prisoner of war,” said Reynolds. “He waited his whole life to see his home energized, but he sadly passed just before our project powered his home.” 

Reynolds said the NTUA emphasized meeting the families who received power.

“Meeting the families and hearing their testimonies was one of the most memorable experiences,” he said. “Until you see how they live, you don’t have any idea how impactful and life-changing this was for them.” 

United Power crews have volunteered to help with Light Up Navajo on three separate projects since July 2024. The cooperative will continue to support this initiative on future projects. 

There has been a lot of talk recently about “saving” certain forms of electric generation, stopping other types, and investing significant resources in technologies that are not ready for prime time. There have also been announcements about building thousands of miles of new transmission line.

When it comes to choices in generation, “all of the above” really needs to be “ALL of the above” if we are going to support electrification across the West and certainly for United Power. 

We recognize that diversity of resources is key to effectively running the cooperative, and we are taking action to ensure a safe, reliable, and affordable electric supply.

United Power partnered with Kindle Energy to open Mountain Peak Power in July. It is the newest and most efficient natural gas plant in Colorado. The 162 MW facility in Weld County provides critical electric capacity and is conveniently located near one of our substations that also has an 11 MW battery energy storage system. This project is a great example of our hyper-localization strategy and highlights the vision we laid out in Our Cooperative Roadmap. The plant was permitted in 10 months and constructed in 10 months. The same project today would take at least four years to obtain the needed equipment at 50% greater cost. 

We are also in the final stages of negotiations for an additional 200 MW of solar, bolstered by 150 MW of battery storage, to replace other expiring thermal generation contracts. These will come online in 2027. The solar facility will be among the largest in Colorado, increasing the carbon-free generation resources in our portfolio to nearly 64% and representing a continued reduction in greenhouse gas emissions since leaving our former wholesale power supplier in May 2024. 

The cooperative pioneered the use of distributed batteries with 115 MW spread across our system at nine substations, ranging in size up to 33 MW. Our engineering team has developed a unique way to automatically manage how we charge and deploy stored energy. These batteries are not only utilized to store energy but also provide critical contingency reserves that save United Power approximately $300,000 per month. 

Recently, United Power joined forces with three other public power utilities — CORE Electric Cooperative, Platte River Power Authority, and Colorado Springs Utilities — to explore creating a regional transmission project, nicknamed Lariat Loop, that will better serve their member-customers. This collaboration aims to reduce electric transmission congestion, enhance system reliability, and expand access to renewable energy sources, all while supporting the State of Colorado’s ambitions carbon reduction goals. 

Our members are directly involved in the “all of the above” electricity strategy. There are nearly 13,000 solar rooftops in our service territory. We will have a new distributed energy resource management system available in January that will allow additional interaction with our members’ resources such as thermostats and electric vehicles. We are rapidly moving to expand our distribution system operations plan, allowing resources from our larger members, such as oil and gas, to be bid into the Southwest Power Pool market coming in April 2026. 

The bottom line is quite simple. While we support expanding transmission and investing in future technologies, and applaud efforts to bring a wide range of generation to the West, we must be realistic about what can be done today to support our growing member base. United Power lives the “all of the above” mantra every day. We buy wind. We buy solar. We buy natural gas. We buy hydropower. And yes, at times we even buy coal. Our focus remains on providing the most reliable and responsible resources we can in our commitment to you, our members.

As always, please feel free to reach out with your questions, comments, or concerns. I enjoy hearing from you and appreciate your continued support.