Dec. 14 main campus power outage

Around 1 p.m. on Tuesday, Dec. 14, the Operations Control Center received calls about a widespread power outage on campus. Xcel Energy reported that an off-campus line was hit at Folsom between Pine and Spruce. Facilities Management initially posted a Tweet about the outage, which was shared by CUPD and other CU social channels. 

Alerts were also sent via text message to all CU affiliates at 1:33 p.m. with a notification that 1:30 p.m. finals would be pushed back to 2 p.m., and at 1:54 p.m. to announce that power was returning to campus. All alerts were also published to alerts.colorado.edu. 

CU’s facilities team worked quickly to realign campus power demands to the one available Xcel feeder and started up the on-campus co-generation plant to provide power redundancy while Xcel worked on repairs to the damaged line. Power to campus buildings was restored at approximately 2 p.m., and Xcel has since repaired the cause of the outage. Facilities Management continued to run the co-generation as a precaution due to Wednesday’s high winds and expected impacts. The West District Energy Plant can provide power and heat to campus buildings and is often used during anticipated weather events in case campus loses its connection to Xcel; the plant can provide power to buildings on Main Campus and some buildings on East Campus.