In front of the recently finished miner’s memorial, Rocky Mountain Power’s new president and chief executive officer Cindy Crane presented the memorial staff with a check for $25,000.
After the event, Crane took the opportunity to speak with the public on a variety of topics. Those in attendance included several Rocky Mountain Power officials as well as representatives from various mines around the area and local and state government leaders.
Crane first praised Rocky Mountain Power for its concern over safety.
“Safety is extremely paramount and important for our business,” Crane expressed. “We saw step-change improvements in our safety performance.”
Continuing her presentation, Crane, who has lived in Utah since 2009 and served as the company’s president since 2014, continued to explain the relationship between the economy and energy.
“We are seeing unprecedented levels of natural gas pricing in the markets,” Crane explained. “We can procure gas seven years into the future today for delivery and it’s lower than any other price we could have procured it since 2002.” According to Crane, buying prices for gasses have followed the same trend.
Crane also explained how, at one time from February to April, five coal units were shut down due to the low prices in the power markets.
“It was not economic for us to run them because the prices in the power markets were extremely cheap; they were single digits,” she asserted. Crane further mentioned how this year the company continues to plan for further low growth.
Crane testified to those in attendance how the drop of coal production is not always due to environmental compliance.
“We are good stewards of the environment and we manage our assets in an extremely environmental way,” she said.
Crane further explained the company’s plans for the future to help change Rocky Mountain Power along with the changing times.
“We have to make sure that we are evolving as our generations are evolving as well,” she explained.
Crane went on the mention how part of that evolution includes the offering of more choices to an ever-growing public that desires info and data.
“Customers want to know that they can have some choices,” she expressed.
Crane also gave a portion of the meeting to the answering of questions, which ranged from issues dealing with solar energy to the company’s mandatory spending budget of $2 million a year for a five-year period to be used in electronic vehicle infrastructure that, according to Crane, will hopefully present a possible solution to concerns of inversion often used against coal production.
