A major natural gas-fired power plant that Colorado Springs Utilities is planning may be moved to a site southeast of Fountain over concerns that exhaust from the plant could create hazards for small private aircraft using the Colorado Springs Airport.
The $650 million Horizon Power Plant is scheduled for completion in 2028 as part of Utilities’ 160-acre Horizon Utility Campus southeast of the Colorado Springs Airport, but construction has been delayed due to the exhaust concerns. The plant would be used to generate power during peak usage rather than continuous operation, with excess power sold off through the electric grid, says Utilities CEO Travas Deal.
Utilities signed a contract last year with Missouri-based ProEnergy Services to manufacture and install the 10 natural-gas fired turbines for the plant. The contract requires all approvals to be in place by April 17, Deal says. The natural gas-fired turbines are similar to those Utilities already uses to generate power on the site of the now-closed and demolished Martin Drake Power Plant in downtown Colorado Springs.
“We are up against contract deadlines” with ProEnergy, Deal says. “We have to have a[n approved] development plan in hand to commence construction by April 17 or we have to move [to the other] options.”
The move would delay construction of the plant since Utilities would need a new air quality approval from the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment and planning approval from El Paso County, but how long that will take, and the additional costs, are unknown, Deal says. The plant also could be renamed since it would no longer be part of the Horizon campus.
High-temperature and fast-moving exhaust from the plant has been a concern since 2021, when Colorado Springs City Council approved a master facilities plan for the campus with a note that says “the future phase 3 [which includes the plant] shall be accompanied by an evaluation regarding exhaust plume impacts and any possible adverse effects to low-flying aircraft.”
Utilities sought city planning and development approval for the plant’s development plan on April 3, 2025, and sought approval from the Federal Aviation Administration for the plant’s 65-foot exhaust stack height and the exhaust plume. The federal agency found the stack heights were not an issue, but last fall’s government shutdown and the agency’s request for further study of the plume delayed the exhaust plume approval.
Studies that Texas infrastructure giant AECOM completed in 2025 and that Canadian construction and engineering firm AtkinsRealis Group finished in January found exhaust plumes from the plant could be a hazard to about 1% of the small general-aviation aircraft taking off from and landing on Colorado Springs Airport’s east runway, but would be unlikely to cause issues with passenger airline flights.
Utilities could mitigate the possible hazard by installing a heat recovery steam generator (HRSG) to slow and cool the exhaust, but Deal says that system would cost $230 million, making the plant not financially feasible to operate. Other options include operating the plant at reduced capacity on cold winter days when the exhaust is more of an issue for small aircraft or changing the flight path of those planes.
If the project moves forward as currently planned, without installing a HRSG, Colorado Springs Airport would be the only airport among its peers with adjacent power plants and operating in controlled airspace without plume-mitigation equipment, according to a Jan. 13 memo to Colorado Springs City Council from the involved agencies.
The heat recovery system generator was shown in the council-approved 2021 master facilities plan but was not included in the April 3 development plan application for the plant. The 2021 master plan also indicated that Utilities planned to move the turbines from the former Drake site in 2025 to the Horizon site, but Utilities officials said overall generation plans evolved between 2021 and 2025.
“Modifying the [generators at the] plant at this point is not the right decision for Colorado Springs Utilities — to go forward would be bad cost decision,” Deal says. “This plant is already bought, so we are limited on what we can do. We are open to any mitigation without changing the power plant. … We will have to make a business decision based on cost reasons. This [the exhaust] is probably only an issue on a handful of days per year.”
The AtkinsRealis study recommended the FAA lead a formal “safety risk management panel” involving key players — including representatives from several of the agency’s divisions, the Colorado Department of Transportation, airport management, the airport control tower, Utilities and Peterson Space Force Base — to identify, assess and mitigate potential safety hazards under FAA safety standards.
That panel, which engineering and construction giant Jacobs will facilitate, is scheduled for an all-day meeting on March 27 with a final report expected by mid-April — just before Utilities’ April 17 contract deadline.
John Buckley III, chairman of the Colorado Springs Airport Advisory Commission, said the seven-member group is “working hard to be fair to all sides.” Commission member Dave Elliott, who also manages Meadow Lake Airport northeast of Colorado Springs, will represent the commission on the panel to “make sure we have all information before we take a position on the power plant,” Buckley says.
Utilities officials told the Airport Advisory Commission in January that the Horizon plant, which would produce 400 megawatts of electricity, is needed because the city-owned enterprise expects construction of 6,700 single-family homes during the next five years, as well as development of the airport’s Peak Innovation Park and the Southern Colorado Rail Park, each of which are expected to need 600 megawatts of power.
In a March 5 statement, Utilities said that it has “to make the best decision for the safety of the community and the organization. The goal is to collaborate with the community to ensure Horizon is a compatible land use with the airport.”
Nearly 1,100 megawatts of electricity demand could come from 32 manufacturing plants, eight data centers and 25 other facilities that companies and government agencies are considering to locate in Colorado Springs, according to the Utilities presentation to the commission. Those projects would bring $17 billion in capital investment and eventually employ more than 8,600 people.
The City of Colorado Springs said in a statement that it “recognizes the Horizon Power Plant as a critical infrastructure project to improve grid reliability, meet future energy demand and drive economic growth in our community.”
It continued, “As the owner and operator of the Colorado Springs Airport, we also recognize our legal obligation to protect the navigable airspace necessary for airport operations, our fiduciary responsibility to comply with federal grant assurance requirements, and to ensure the Airport remains safe and efficient for the flying public. City leadership is fully committed to working with” the FAA and Utilities at the March 27 meeting.
The Horizon Campus already includes an electric substation and detention pond, and is expected to eventually include an 18-acre solar array, a battery storage facility to store 100 megawatts of electricity, two natural gas transfer stations and a service center. The alternative site near Fountain is adjacent to a Utilities substation and the 175-megawatt Pike Solar array, both of which opened in 2023.
Nick Peters, Utilities’ chief system and planning projects officer, said in an email that the organization would re-evaluate overall plans for the campus if the planned power plant moves to the site near Fountain.
Utilities’ current power-generation facilities — including coal, natural gas, wind, solar and hydroelectric sources — produce about 1,400 megawatts of power. The peak summer demand is more than 900 megawatts with a reserve power cushion of 16% in the summer and 32% in the winter, when electricity demand is lower. Utilities also purchases power on the open market, particularly in winter months.