Nathan Schneider
Absolutely incredible to see the clean-energy turnaround of Tri-State, the power generation co-op that only recently notorious for clinging to dirty sources. Thanks for the reporting, @coloradosun: https://coloradosun.com/2024/08/14/tri-state-generation-colorado-renewable-energy-switch/
Any context to add @ZaneSelvans?
Zane Selvans
@ntnsndr @coloradosun I think the direct-pay option for tax credits in the IRA was a big part of it. And also getting new leadership:
https://bigpivots.com/duane-highley-talks-tri-states-journey-from-coal/
Nathan Schneider
Dang nothing like a good tax credit to make co-ops finally act like co-ops
Luis Villa
@ntnsndr customer-owned coops exist to provide their customers with cheap goods. So… afaict they were acting like a customer-owned coops the whole time?
Nathan Schneider
Through all this I am grateful that member co-ops were putting TS's feet to the fire. Those were not easy moves.
Zane Selvans
@luis_in_brief @ntnsndr It looks like they've applied for USDA New ERA funding in conjunction with their 2023 resource plan, but haven't heard back from the feds about it yet. They did get a $75M 0% interest loan from USDA though.
https://tristate.coop/tri-state-advances-ERP-with-unopposed-settlement-filing
Zane Selvans
In addition to the direct-pay tax-credits, the IRA provided a refinancing mechanism through the USDA that I think also played a big role in facilitating the early retirements:
https://www.rd.usda.gov/programs-services/electric-programs/empowering-rural-america-new-era-program
Zane Selvans
@luis_in_brief @ntnsndr They also did this thing where the CO PUC was going to maybe let the member co-ops exit without paying the termination tariffs, so Tri-State begged FERC to be their regulator instead, and FERC agreed, and came to a different conclusion than the CO PUC:
Zane Selvans
@luis_in_brief @ntnsndr But the trick of securitizing existing assets with very low cost (state backed) debt to get them off the balance sheet doesn't work for co-ops, because they're already ~100% debt financed, sometimes with below market rates from the USDA, which means there's much less in the way of savings to be had from refinancing.
Zane Selvans
@luis_in_brief @ntnsndr Ehhh, they had some pretty big "autonomy and independence" violations, locking their members into multi-decade contracts that prohibited them from doing more than 5% self (distributed) generation, to the point where members were suing to defect and do their own renewable development -- which was at that point lower cost. TSGT needed financing to get out from under their big past fossil capital investments.
Nathan Schneider
@GEO_Collective @luis_in_brief Absolutely. And the Tri-State story is very much one of member organizing, as well as inspired managerial leadership. I had the opportunity to report on part of this story—Delta Montrose, the first CO co-op to leave TS—in my book Everything for Everyone, and here: https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/economic-democracy-and-the-billion-dollar-co-op/
Grassroots Economic Organizing
@luis_in_brief @ntnsndr If the members decide they want the co-op to provide clean power, the leadership needs to work to make that happen. If the members want clean power generation and the leadership acts to subvert that desire, it is a failure of the cooperative structure, not it working as intended. Here's one example of co-op members taking (back) control of their electric co-op to rectify failures of this sort 👇
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