Xcel is cutting power to Minnesota homes in record numbers

Casie Lowen knew she was past due on her power bill. Costs stacked up after she had a baby in 2020, followed by health problems and a breakup. She had trouble finding consistent work.

“It’s my own fault,” Lowen said. “Things happen, I got behind.”

Then Xcel Energy shut off electricity to her St. Paul apartment in May. A fridge full of food spoiled. Lowen said she ran an extension cord into her hallway to keep a freezer full of meat from going bad. She was at risk of eviction because being disconnected is against her lease.

Xcel wanted $450, she said. “That’s what I live on a month,” she said.

Lowen lined up government help for energy bills, and agreed to a payment plan. Xcel turned the lights back on about one day after they went out.

In Minnesota, that kind of life-altering disruption is becoming more common.

Most of Minnesota’s largest power companies are shutting off heat or electricity for their customers in record numbers in the years after a temporary ban on the practice during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Xcel is on pace to match its own record in 2025.

The company and consumer advocates agree that many Minnesotans are facing money problems in a period of high inflation. There’s another factor contributing to Xcel’s record-high shut-offs. In May 2023, Xcel began turning off power to its customers remotely, instead of visiting each home in person.

That change, approved by state utility regulators, is possible because of new meters Xcel is installing for every Minnesota customer.

“The fact that they can disconnect people just with the push of a button makes it a thousand times more efficient,” said George Shardlow, executive director of the Energy Cents Coalition, which advocates for low-income utility customers and helps Xcel administer bill-assistance programs.

In the five years before the COVID-19 pandemic hit, the number of homes Xcel shut off from gas and electricity declined.

“What we’re seeing there is really the continued impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on our customers,” said Ryan Long, who leads Xcel in Minnesota. “A lot of customers built up pretty large past-due balances during that period. It’s taken us time to work through those issues.”

The average Xcel customer past due on their bill owed $270 in 2019. That figure was nearly double between 2021 and 2024. Another factor raised by Xcel: Federal money for low-income heating assistance available during the pandemic was reduced in 2023.

In 2019, Xcel said it needed to replace its old meters with new ones that would enable faster response to outages and cost-saving pricing programs. They also made the task of turning the power on and off far easier.

Under state rules, an electric or heat provider had to send an employee to the home of a customer to shut off power. In 2023, the PUC gave Xcel permission to skip that step.

Xcel said customers rarely answer the door and that a final phone call and a voicemail at the end of its nine-week shut-off process is more effective. The company argued it’s cheaper, more efficient and safer for its workers.

Xcel used to cut off service to less than 10% of customers that it could have. This year, it’s 29%.

Last year, a group of nonprofits and Attorney General Keith Ellison asked the PUC to put a temporary stop to Xcel’s shut-offs. Some cited the smart meters as a factor, as well as research by the University of Minnesota and Xcel that households in neighborhoods with more people of color were far more likely to be disconnected than those in mostly white areas.

“The rising rate in shut-offs, plus the disparities in shut-off rate, is really going to disproportionately impact people of color,” said Shubha Harris, chief equity policy officer for the clean-energy advocacy organization Fresh Energy.

Xcel argued that another moratorium could hurt low-income customers, rather than help them. During the pandemic-era moratorium, customers were less likely to use payment plans and affordability programs, Xcel said.

Many “stacked up past-due balances that are too large to ever realistically pay off,” said spokesman Theo Keith.

The PUC eventually extended Xcel’s permission to remotely disconnect customers — after the company agreed to new consumer protections.

That included reducing down payment requirements for customers in payment plans, a ban on disconnecting customers who owe less than $300 and plans to reconnect customers during days with extreme heat or air pollution.

Xcel has also advanced a pilot project to give people in certain low-income areas bill credits that would average to more than $450 a year. The company also says its smart meters allow it to restore power faster and with less cost to the customer.

Long said Xcel works to avoid shut-offs. The company’s lengthy process includes many efforts to contact customers by email, phone and mail, start payment plans and discuss energy assistance. At the same time, Xcel’s other customers end up bearing the cost of past-due bills, he said.

Now, however, the increase in shut-offs has started a debate over whether Xcel is making people pay too much. Minnesota law requires the PUC to set “just and reasonable rates” for public utilities.

Keith said bills for its residential customers are, on average, 32% below the national average over the last 12 months. Since 2013, the increase on the average bill for a Minnesota household has been well below the rate of inflation, Keith said.

Still, “the data is really clear that lots of people can’t afford these bills,” said Annie Levenson-Falk, executive director of the Citizens Utility Board of Minnesota. “You need to think about being very careful with any rate increases and doing everything you can to keep rates, overall, lower.”

Levenson-Falk said her organization wants the PUC to eliminate fees for late payments and for reconnecting power.

Disconnection can make people poorer, less likely to pay electricity bills in the future and more likely to face other problems like mental health crises and paying for food and medicine, says a letter written by Cooperative Energy Futures, Environmental Law & Policy Center, Sierra Club and Vote Solar.