Xcel Energy CEO Bemoans Climate-Denying Politicians Funded By Xcel

Retiring Xcel Energy CEO Dick Kelly is baffled how politicians “can deny the science” of climate pollution, complaining that all they care about is re-election. However, dozens of the nation’s top climate-denying politicians have received thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from the Great Plains electrical utility.

Kelly “has been about the business of driving Xcel to switch coal plants to natural gas, and he’s made Xcel the No. 1 provider of wind-produced electricity in the country,” writes Don Shelby in MinnPost.com. “We have a problem with CO2,” Kelly said in the interview. “The science is done. It is clear that CO2 is not good.” Kelly told Shelby that he “really” doesn’t know why politicians have rejected climate science and the need to “get off fossil fuels”:

“We’ve got to get off fossil fuels,” Kelly said. “The quicker the better.”

“But, there are a lot of people in Congress who wouldn’t agree,” I said.

“I know it,” replied Kelly. “All they are worried about is the next two or six years when they run for reelection. They just keep kicking the can down the road.”

Then he adds, thoughtfully: “I don’t know how they can deny the science. I really don’t.”

The answer really isn’t very complicated: coal and oil interests pump millions of dollars into the re-election of politicians that promote their fossil-pollution agenda. And one of the those companies is Dick Kelly’s Xcel Energy. In fact, the top receipients of the Xcel Energy PAC’s largesse over the years are global warming deniers Rep. Earl Pomeroy (D-ND) and Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX). Other top recipients include Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-OK), Rep. John Boehner (R-OH), and Rep. Fred Upton (R-MI).

XCEL’S CLIMATE DENIERS
Recipient	Contributions
Earl Pomeroy (D-ND)	$27,000
Joe Barton (R-TX)	$24,750
James M Inhofe (R-OK)	$19,000
Tim Johnson (D-SD)	$17,905
John Thune (R-SD)	$16,250
Chuck Grassley (R-IA)	$16,000
Norm Coleman (R-MN)	$15,000
John Boehner (R-OH)	$13,000
Dave Camp (R-MI)	$12,500
John Kline (R-MN)	$12,450
Fred Upton (R-MI)	$12,250
Erik Paulsen (R-MN)	$11,500
Gil Gutknecht (R-MN)	$11,250
Marilyn Musgrave (R-CO)	$10,500
Jim Ramstad (R-MN)	$10,500
Paul Ryan (R-WI)	$10,200
Wayne Allard (R-CO)	$10,197
John A Barrasso (R-WY)	$10,000
Bob Beauprez (R-CO)	$10,000
Opponents of climate change policy who have received at least $10,000 from Xcel Energy PAC since 1998.

In total Xcel Energy PAC has contributed over $500,000 to politicians, mostly in the Republican Party, who question the science of global warming and oppose any efforts to limit greenhouse pollution. If Dick Kelly can’t understand why they keep getting re-elected, he should take a closer look in the mirror.