Power Plants in Colorado

Colorado's power sector in numbers

Bywatts maps 114 operating power plants with 15.6 GW of nameplate capacity in Colorado. Coal leads with 38% of that capacity across 9 plants, followed by Natural Gas (35%) and Wind (14%). The inventory also includes 18 plants (713 MW) that EIA-860 lists as retired, 3 partly retired with no operable units of their recorded fuel and 1 never built; the largest retired plant is ARAPAHOE (153 MW, retired 2013).

The largest operating plants are COMANCHE (1,635 MW, Coal, PUBLIC SERVICE CO OF COLORADO), CRAIG (1,428 MW, Coal, TRI-STATE G & T ASSN, INC) and FORT ST VRAIN (1,149 MW, Natural Gas, PUBLIC SERVICE CO OF COLORADO).

Of the 111 operating plants with a recorded commissioning year, 49 came online in 2000 or later and 18 in 2010 or later; the busiest decade for new capacity was the 2000s (4.7 GW).

The largest operators by operating capacity are PUBLIC SERVICE CO OF COLORADO (16 plants, 5.9 GW), TRI-STATE G & T ASSN, INC (5 plants, 2.3 GW) and CITY OF COLORADO SPRINGS (7 plants, 1.2 GW).

Retail electricity sales in Colorado reached 56.7 TWh in 2025, up 4.7% over ten years and down 0.3% year on year; residential customers took 36.1% of it. The average retail price across all sectors was 12.77 cents per kWh, up 28.4% since 2015.

The database also maps 495 named substations (22 of the 449 with a recorded voltage are rated 345 kV or above), 6 data centers (operators include CoreSite, Equinix and IPI Partners), 285 solar installers and 108 solar companies in Colorado.

Operating capacity by fuel

Retail electricity sales

Sources: HIFLD power-plant inventory (capacity, fuel, operator), EIA-860 (commissioning year, retirements, operable capacity), EIA retail sales and revenue series through January 2026. Counts are of plants Bywatts lists, not every generator in the state.