On March 18, 2026, Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser filed a petition to overturn an unlawful emergency order issued by the Department of Energy. The order would require the coal-fired Craig Unit 1 in Moffat County, CO, to be available until March 30, even though it was scheduled to shut down. 

Attorney General Weiser argued that the Energy Department’s December 30, 2025, order is unlawful and unnecessary. According to the petition, there is no energy emergency that justifies forcing the plant to stay open. The plant’s retirement has been planned for years as part of a transition to cleaner and more affordable energy. Continued operation of an inefficient coal plant would both increase costs for Colorado consumers and the private owner of the plant and would cause environmental harms to Colorado through release of hazardous particulate matter. The plant owners made plans in 2016 to retire the unit this year. 

On January 28, Attorney General Weiser filed a request for rehearing, urging the Energy Department to act at the agency level rescinding the order because it improperly interferes with the state’s authority to design and manage power generation resources in Colorado. This petition follows the Energy Department’s denial of the state’s rehearing request and asks the court to vacate the emergency order. 

The long-anticipated retirement of Craig Unit 1 and replacing it with cleaner and more affordable energy resources was the result of a carefully planned process that was driven by economics. There is no energy emergency, and stopping the Craig unit’s retirement would not ease any imagined energy need. Left unchallenged, the Energy Department’s order will result in unnecessary costs passed onto Coloradans in higher electric bills and more pollution in the region. The order is an unlawful abuse of the department’s emergency authority and should be rescinded.Attorney General Phil Weiser