Denver7’s team put a very Colorado headline on the table: more homeowners are buying backup generators and battery storage because the risk of outages is rising, especially during extreme fire conditions. Maggie Bryan reports that as fire danger becomes “a way of life” during one of the driest winters in decades, people are increasingly assuming the lights might go out, either by accident or on purpose.
The article notes that Xcel Energy began using preemptive power shutoffs as a wildfire mitigation tool in March 2024 and has since conducted additional shutoffs between December 2025 and January 2026, affecting customers along the Front Range and in northern Colorado. This week, the story says neither Xcel nor CORE said they plan to shut off power during the current weather event, but homeowners are accepting the reality that future outages are likely.
The Bullet Point Brief
- Xcel has normalized preemptive shutoffs as a fire mitigation tool, which is a polite way of saying: the wind might blow, so good luck with your refrigerator and your kids homework.
- One local company, Bell Plumbing and Heating, says generator requests used to be about a dozen a year. Now they are getting about seven requests a week. That is not a trend. That is a flashing warning light.
- People are not buying backup power for fun. The story lists practical needs: sump pumps, food storage, and medical equipment like home oxygen machines that cannot just power through an outage.
- Aurora Fire Rescue is staffing extra wildland fire engines, and their PIO says the red flag warnings and critical fire weather feel more frequent than what he has seen in his career. That is the field telling you the risk is changing.
- Xcel says it plans to activate enhanced safety settings on powerlines across eastern Colorado, making them more sensitive so they shut off automatically if something contacts the line. Great for ignition prevention. Not great for a functioning modern life.
My Bottom Line
The wind is predicted to blow this week and Xcel is out here basically saying, “We might shut ‘er down.” More businesses closed. More kids out of school. More families juggling life by flashlight because liability is a beast, the threat of trial lawyers is real, and Colorado has spent the last several years treating reliability like a secondary value.
And here’s the part that should make every “energy transition” cheerleader pause: regular people are now shopping for Tesla Powerwalls and natural gas generators like it is milk and eggs. Not because it is trendy. Because they are being trained by experience that the grid may not hold up when the weather gets spicy. That is not resiliency. That is a quiet, expensive vote of no confidence.
I get the wildfire risk. I want lines hardened and communities protected. But we are drifting into a world where the default answer is: Just turn it off. Meanwhile, the Gold Dome keeps mandating an energy winner, and it is not reliability that won that contest.
How about we focus on fortifying the grid? How about we prioritize energy generation and delivery that stays on when the wind decides it might blow, and when a branch decides it might branch. That is not partisan. That is civilization.
And to the normies out there: yes, this all has a link to policy. If you want proof, look at the growing list of Coloradans preparing to buy their own personal power plant because they cannot trust the system we are paying for.
Source: Denver 7
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