Complete Colorado reports that Gov. Jared Polis has signed Colorado onto an 11-state western agreement aimed at speeding up permitting for new electric transmission lines. The deal endorses the Western Transmission Expansion Coalition and creates a new permitting task force meant to coordinate agencies, align schedules and reduce the state-by-state bottlenecks that slow construction.
The stated case is straightforward. The West’s grid is old, demand is rising, and transmission projects can get buried under a thicket of agencies that do not share calendars, standards or urgency. Fine. Faster permitting is probably useful. But transmission is not generation, and Colorado’s ruling class keeps acting like the wires are the power plant.
The Bullet Point Brief
- Colorado joined Utah, Arizona, Wyoming, Nevada, Montana, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, North Dakota and New Mexico in backing the regional transmission effort.
- The new task force is supposed to identify priority lines, coordinate with tribes and neighboring states, and create common permitting timelines. In bureaucrat English, this means fewer agencies losing the same paperwork in different buildings.
- WestTEC is not a new government agency. It is an industry-led planning effort involving utilities, grid planners, governments and public-interest groups.
- Supporters say the West needs more transmission to handle population growth, maintenance demands and the push to electrify more of daily life.
- The obvious problem remains generation. Wires move electricity. They do not create it. A bigger grid carrying less dependable power is still a bad bargain, just spread over more counties.
My Bottom Line
Polis wants credit for grid modernization after years of backing an energy agenda that makes dispatchable generation harder to build, harder to keep and politically radioactive to defend. That is the hypocrisy sitting in the middle of this deal wearing a safety vest.
Faster permitting may help. Regional coordination may help. Geothermal development may help. None of those facts changes the basic engineering reality that Colorado needs abundant, dependable power when the sun is down, the wind is weak and everybody is trying to heat the house, charge the car and run the data center at the same time.
The Colorado energy blob keeps confusing infrastructure with energy. Transmission lines are useful, but they are not magic extension cords plugged into the sky. Restrict supply, mandate demand, socialize the costs, then announce a regional partnership to manage the strain. That is not visionary. That is an expensive panic room with a climate-action logo.
Normal Coloradans hear “modernization” and eventually see another line item on the utility bill. They deserve to know what gets built, who pays, what reliable generation backs it up, what land gets crossed and who is accountable when the model collides with weather and reality.
A transmission line without enough dependable generation is just a taxpayer-and-ratepayer-funded clothesline for political virtue.
Source: Complete Colorado
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