Options: Town Shop or Elementary School

. . .

4 - 6 hours power outage back-up electric service for Rico-area

above image:
San Miguel Power Association consultant Terry Schuyler describes Ricomicrogrid battery energy storage location options at Rico Board of Trustees Monthly Meeting September 17, 2025 at Rico Town Hall

image source:
Trustees Meeting webcast

by Allyn Svoboda
Publisher

note
Blue text below is quotations from September 9, 2025 correspondence to Town Manager and reprinted in the September 17, 2025 Trustees Meeting Packet. Purple text is Town Manager comments in the Meeting Packet.

. . .

Rico School is the Rico Board of Trustees preferred choice for San Miguel Power Association (SMPA) to install a battery energy storage system for electric service reliability at Rico.

Trustees considered the school and the Rico Town Shop-Pavilion-Skatepark area during a presentation by SMPA representatives at Trustees' September 17, 2025 monthly meeting, 7:00 PM at Rico Town Hall. Purpose of the SMPA presentation is described in the Trustees Meeting Packet:

No formal action is requested at this meeting, but SMPA is seeking direction from the Board on whether the Town would be willing to pursue a land agreement for placement of the battery system at 101 S. Picker Street, which is zoned Public Facility.

Correspondence September 9, 2025 to Rico Town Manager Chauncey McCarthy from SMPA consultant Terry Schuyler requested Town of Rico consider these two possible sites for batteries which will provide backup electric service for the entire town. This correspondence is reprinted in the Trustees Meeting Packet.

SMPA is asking the Town Manager and the Board of Trustees to view this Partnership as in the best interest of all residents while providing multiple value streams. SMPA seeks Trustee approval and requests initiation of all required permits and processes as soon as practical.

SMPA first described the microgrid project to Rico Trustees in February 2023. Colorado Department of Local Affairs (DOLA) awarded SMPA $1.4 million for Rico battery construction from its Microgrids for Community Resilience program. SMPA must spend half of this by June 2026, according to the SMPA correspondence to Town Manager.

4 – 6 hours battery backup for alll

The microgrid battery energy storage system will provide 1,500 KiloWatt-hours of reliable backup power for all electric service types in the Rico area, according to the SMPA correspondence.

• all Rico residents
• all Town municipal buildings
• school building
• proposed Rico geothermal energy network heating network equipment

This capacity is sufficient for 4-6 hours of Rico's power use, according to SMPA. To allow for future increase in electricity consumption, SMPA increased KiloWatt-hours capacity from the 1,320 KiloWatt-hours previously approved for grant funding by Colorado DOLA. SMPA will incur additional cost for this upgrade, according to an SMPA correspondence received by Ore Cart September 18, 2025.

Solar-electric panel owners will provide some re-charging capacity to the central battery during electric service interruptions (power outages). When SMPA electric service is stable, solar electricity generated but not used in homes and businesses flows through the electric meter and transformer to SMPA powerlines in Rico. When a power outage is detected, individual solar panel systems automatically disconnect from SMPA powerlines. Back-up electric service provided by the Rico community battery will allow solar panels to remain connected.

Solar-electric panels rely on sunshine to generate electricity. Production is reduced on cloudy days, and no electricity is produced at night.

Weather or tree-fall between Rico and the SMPA substation near Ames and are common causes by powerline damage and resulting electric service interruptions.

SMPA map of terrain and powerline route (white) along Hwy 145 first published in Ore Cart - February 10, 2023. The powerline begins at an electric substation 2.8 miles north of the Hwy 145 Ophir curve on the Ilium Rd near Ames. Total roadway distance from substation to Rico is 19.4 miles (Google Map).
> yellow labels added by Ore Cart

Battery location options

Rico school building property
The school has been vacant since Dolores County School District closed elementary grades classes. Site ownership transferred to Telluride School District following a vote by Rico, Dove Creek and Telluride areas citizens in 2023 to detach Rico from Dolores County School District and annex to Telluride School District.

Rico Town shop, skatepark and pavilion area
101 S. Picker Street - west side of the Dolores River.

RICO SCHOOL

SMPA aerial photo of Rico School area showing proposed microgrid battery location.
> Yellow labels added by Ore Cart.

SMPA staff met with Telluride School District staff to consider Rico school for the community battery location. Result of this collaboration:

Possibility of siting the battery on School property to the north of the closed school building on the vacant parcel that currently contains a large propane tank (shown in red highlight). We would include a fence or wall (possibly using brick) to secure the hardware and limit public access for safety, in such a way as to blend with the aesthetics of the School Building.

Possibly siting some of the equipment inside the school in the old boiler and coal shoot rooms located on the north end of the school building. These two rooms have no future useful purpose and are effectively isolated from the rest of the useable school classrooms, kitchen, and bathrooms. They currently contain old boiler equipment which would be removed.

Northeast corner of Rico School

Ore Cart photo
September 18, 2025

Proposed school agreement includes “resiliency hub”

Securing a lease agreement with the School District at little to no annual cost but include provisions for:

• SMPA would re-energize the electric service at the school and possibly cover the electric bills for a future Community Center located there - providing value to the School and the Rico community at large.
• SMPA would work to secure future possible funding to transition all or a part of the school into a Resilience Hub – emergency shelter for use during future emergency situations such as the recent wildfire. The Resilience Hub could be used as a gathering place for residents and visitors to secure shelter and charge their computers, cell phones, and other devices during extended power outages – those beyond the capacity of the community microgrid battery provisions. SMPA also applied for a DOLA grant to enable the Town of Ridgway to create a Resilience Hub. See https://www.smpa.com/ridgway-completes-microgrid-project-and-establishes-community-resilience-hub-extreme-weather
• The School Community Center can incrementally be brought back into usefulhabitation for other community events, providing ongoing value to the Rico Community and school district.
  

TOWN SHOP, SKATEPARK and PAVILION

Contractor crew installs electrical system at Pavilion near Town Shop and Skatepark.

Ore Cart photo
September 18, 2025

On this path SMPA would request to site the storage and microgrid control hardware directly on Town-owned land. SMPA conducted drone surveillance mapping and have identified several possible placement sites on the property that currently hosts the new Town Shop, Pavilion, and Skate Park. See the map below. SMPA would bring in the three phase line as an underground service as is indicated in by the green arrows.

To proceed on this path SMPA is requesting the Board of Trustees approve exploring any required permits and a land lease option at little to no annual lease cost. . . .

Site concerns

SMPA aerial photo of Rico Town Shop-Skatepark-Pavilion area showing protential microgrid battery locations (red boxes) and new underground power cables (green lines). Existing powerline poles are beyond the bottom edge of photo.
> Yellow labels and map direction arrow added by Ore Cart

. . .

Town Manager Chauncey McCarthy described possible conflicts with Town facilities at this location in the Trustees Meeting Packet:

On the image provided by SMPA, the red boxes indicate possible locations for the system. The box to the left would interfere with potential future park improvements including Phase II of the skatepark and a pump track, while the box to the far right would conflict with the proposed sewer treatment plant location. The box in the middle may work but the location would need to be tweaked to not interfere with an existing easement in that location.

Geothermal pipes network would continue to deliver heat

The proposed Rico thermal energy network would use electric pumps to circulate hot liquid in buried pipes from a geothermal well to homes, businesses and public buildings. SMPA’s community battery will have capacity to supply this use:

The microgrid will be sized to meet the estimated electric load requirements of any future Geothermal District Heating network – which will not be functional without reliable electric power. Once implemented the microgrid storage would also provide heating resilience to the Town.

History of microgrid project

> Summary of information in September 9 correspondence and September 17 Trustees Meeting Packet

First grant awarded
SMPA applied for and was granted a $30,000 “planning grant” by Colorado Department of Local Affairs (DOLA) to design a “Microgrid for Community Resilience” system for Rico. The original plan included both community solar panels and batteries. See Microgrids for Community Resilience Awardees To-Date Row 10.

No solar panel array site
At completion of the DOLA planning grant project, SMPA had found no viable location for a community solar panel array. These solar panels would have provided battery-charging capacity when regular electric service from the north is interrupted.

Second grant awarded
Next, SMPA applied for and received a $1.4 million DOLA grant for construction of the battery electric energy storage system. The construction grant requires SMPA spend half of the $1.4 million by June 2026.

Search for battery site
Locating a suitable site for the battery storage and control hardware near an SMPA three-phase powerline in or near-north of Rico was a challenge. In addition to school and Town shop-slatepark-pavilion, SMPA considered:

• Multiple locations at Atlantic Richfield mine remediation brownfield.
• Multiple privately owned sites.
• Fire Station lot.

SMPA recently released a Request for Proposals for an Engineering Procurement and Construction (EPC) contractor.

SUBSCRIBE
to Rico Ore Cart
new reports announcements
- - -
enter email address below