Review of Southwestern Public Service Company's 2021 Integrated Resource Plan and Tolk Station Analysis
Synapse supported the Sierra Club in its engagement with Southwestern Public Service (SPS’s) Tolk Station Analysis process. This analysis was required as part of the company's larger Integrated Resource Planning (IRP) process based on an agreement reached between Sierra Club and SPS in a prior rate case. Synapse attended and participated in the Tolk Technical Analysis and IRP workshops and stakeholder sessions on behalf of Sierra Club to review the assumptions and methodology that SPS was using and provide feedback on the reasonableness of the company’s modeling.
Synapse reviewed the final Tolk Analysis report and modeling files provided by SPS and conducted updated modeling runs to correct various errors and concerning assumptions that we identified in SPS’s modeling. Among the omissions that Synapse identified was SPS’s failure to include a carbon price sensitivity in the Tolk Analysis. Synapse included the results of our review of SPS’s report, as well as the results of our updated modeling in a technical report filed with the Commission.