Former legislator Chris Hansen has joined La Plata Electric as CEO. Will he be a good fit for leading La Plata into the energy future?
by Allen Best
Credit La Plata Electric with the ability to keep a secret. The first report that Chris Hansen had been hired as the Durango-based electrical cooperative’s chief executive officer did not come out until Monday afternoon. On Tuesday morning he was already on the job.
I hadn’t heard the first rumor until several days before, and that rumor had him in Fort Collins. A report on Monday by Marianne Goodland at Colorado Politics, possibly the first to deliver the news, correctly placed him at La Plata.
The move surprised me. I had expected Hansen would continue to seek higher political office. He became a major player at the Colorado Legislature after his election to the House of Representatives in 2018 and then his elevation to the Colorado Senate in early 2020 to fill a vacancy. He was the sponsor of dozens of energy and climate bills, many in tandem with another bright mind, Sen. Steve Fenberg.
In 2023, Hansen ran for the mayor of Denver. It had been a stepping stone for John Hickenlooper on his way to the governor’s mansion. He got only 4.8% of the primary election votes, though. Was there another way upward in politics? Roy Romer, like Hansen, a native of the high plains, had been elected state treasurer in 1977, using that as a stepping stone to the governor’s mansion in 1986.
I see Hansen’s move as part of a theme. The co-op world in Colorado has been attracting some bright minds. Bryan Hannegan literally left the laboratory for the real world in July 2017 when he left the National Renewable Energy Laboratory to lead Holy Cross Energy. Then Mark Gabriel left the Western Area Power Administration to run the show at United Power. He had written a book, ”Visions for a Sustainable Energy Future,” which was published in 2009.
Where Hansen’s story differs is that he arrives at La Plata on a course that has partly been charted.
Holy Cross Energy was still strapped at the hip with Xcel Energy and coal when Hannegan was hired. But he was given authority to chart a more aggressive course for decarbonization even than Xcel.
United Power was already drifting toward the door in an exit from Tri-State Generation and Transmission Associaton when Gabriel was hired in 2021. He created the strategy about how to go forward.
At La Plata, Hansen has taken the helm with a corner or two already rounded. Matlock returned to the Pacific Northwest in mid-March. Ten days later, directors of La Plata filed the conditional notice with Tri-State of plans to exit in two years, as required by its contract. In mid-September, La Plata contracted with Mercuria to help it secure its power. Once it is independent of Tri-State in March 2026. Last week, it announced an agreement to get some of its power from Tri-State.
The cooperative has 36,500 members in La Plata and Archuleta counties.
Is Hansen a good fit for those two counties in southwestern Colorado? He grew up in Goodland, Kan., just across the border from Colorado. He bucked hay bales as a boy.
As a high school junior, he became enamored of a nuclear reactor he saw during a field trip to Kansas State University. He returned there to earn a degree in engineering, but confided to me once that by his junior year he had become more intrigued by economics. He went on to earn a master’s degree in science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
At Oxford University, he earned a Ph.D. in economic geography. While there, he also was a research fellow at the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, focusing on solutions for bringing renewable power to underserved rural areas in India.
He subsequently worked as an energy consultant with postings around the world. Clearly, he’s a smart guy.
La Plata’s announcement had the kind, enthusiastic words you would expect.
“Not only is Chris a visionary leader, but he is also deeply passionate about our industry and values our cooperative culture,” said Ted Compton, the president of the board of directors.
“We believe he will be instrumental in helping us navigate the challenges ahead. His dedication to cooperative values will ensure that LPEA continues to excel while remaining true to its roots.”
Via a text, one member of La Plata had this to say: “Ecstatic.”
Do you need administrative experience to be an effective cooperative manager? He had what he describes as significant managerial roles at IHS Energy, an international consultancy, before he resigned to run for the Colorado Legislature in 2015. Some raised their eyebrows, wanting more evidence on his resumé.
Also in question is how Hansen will relate to some of the ranchers of Southwest Colorado. In Durango, he’s a perfect fit. But the outlying areas have somewhat different attitudes and a broader distrust of the “elites.” There are trophy ranches, hobby ranches and even a few old-style working ranches. Will Hansen, despite his great knowledge, be able communicate effectively?
I’ve gone to the annual meetings of United Power and Holy Cross Energy, and Gabriel and Hannegan speak very differently to their general membership than they do in other contexts. The messages are greatly simplified. Moreover, I’ve sort of understood the level of patience required of those who can see ahead of others of us.
Does Hansen have that patience and those skills? I suspect he does.
Leaving Tri-State is only the start for La Plata. The cooperative has been at odds with Tri-State at least for several years. For example, it was the first in Colorado to connect electric batteries of school buses to the grid so that power can flow both ways. It’s small, but part of the innovation that will ultimately occur everywhere.
As for the Legislature, I see a void. Hansen has his name on many of the 156 bills passed in the General Assembly in recent years that together are trying to spin Colorado around the corner to dramatic reductions in emissions.
Often he has paired with Fenberg to sponsor key legislation. This year, for example, they teamed on three climate and energy bills, among them SB24-218, the distributed energy system described by some as the most important climate and energy legislation of the session.
The argument can be made that Colorado has already adopted much of the legislation necessary to define this energy transition. Now, it’s a matter of executing the vision. And if current and future legislators’ expertise does not rise to the same level as those of Hansen and Fenberg, who is term- limited and will leave office in January, many others have bright minds and interest in accelerating the energy transition to comport with the emergency that climate scientists have defined. We’ll see who those individuals are in coming months and years.
A final note: I first truly took note of Hansen in August 2019. I had gone to Fort Morgan, where an interim legislative committee was to meet. I had grown up in that town, walking by the courthouse where the meeting was held on my way to middle school. Hansen chaired the legislative committee, and he told a representative from Wray that he knew he had run cross-country on the golf course there. “A fine golf course,” he said.
Then a county commissioner from Logan County issued a verbal reprimand to the legislators for talking about renewable energy when they should be talking about nuclear energy. Hansen responded briefly but clearly indicated he knew something about nuclear power.
Only later did I realize he had had grown up in Kansas and had a degree in nuclear engineering.
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Two things that bear mentioning that the article omits: 1. Resigning from an elected position soon after the election is a selfish act, especially when you consider the monetary contributions supporters made to the re-election campaign. 2. The Durango Herald reports that the advertised salary for the position is in the range $400,000-$600,000 (and the previous CEO earned $545,000 in 2023). Hansen wants to be an elite; he abandons a powerful position for a lucrative one.