Minneapolis (June 19, 2018) –Xcel Energy and the City of Burnsville are giving new life to monarch butterflies, honey bees and other pollinators by dedicating three acres of land to restore their habitat.
Burnsville community leaders and local Cub Scouts and Girl Scouts today helped plant milkweed and other pollinator-friendly plants on native prairie land near Tennisioux Park underneath Xcel Energy transmission lines near the Black Dog power plant. Today’s event was part of National Pollinator Week, an effort to promote and boost a dramatically declining monarch butterfly population.
“We’re honored to work with national and local partners who share Xcel Energy’s commitment to the environment and to protecting important pollinators,” said Chris Clark, president, Xcel Energy-Minnesota. “This initiative is part of larger campaign Xcel Energy launched more than a decade ago to build up the habitat butterflies and bees need to thrive.”
“Good things happen when volunteers, businesses and the City all come together,” said Burnsville Mayor Elizabeth Kautz. “Burnsville is very passionate about maintaining its natural resources and helping them thrive. Partnerships such as this one with Xcel Energy only further help spread that message about these initiatives.”
Xcel Energy has a pollinator initiative in place to identify opportunities to plant milkweed and other native plants on Xcel Energy owned property, including near substations and utility rights-of-way. This new habitat in Burnsville will help strengthen the Monarch Migration corridor, an area that roughly parallels Interstate 35 from Minnesota to Texas.
Xcel Energy supports pollinators at several sites throughout our service territories. Some of the pollinator habitats the company maintains are located in Monticello, Bloomington and Plymouth, Minnesota. Xcel Energy also recently planted 40 acres of pollinator habitat surrounding a new substation in North Dakota, as well as a pollinator habitat under a transmission line right-of-way in Wisconsin.
There are several more plantings scheduled this year to support our pollinator efforts in Minnesota and Wisconsin along our transmission line right of way, outside substations, our offices and on a solar property. Xcel Energy currently has more than 1,300 acres of active pollinator habitat at 30 locations in Minnesota, North Dakota, and Wisconsin.
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About Xcel Energy
Xcel Energy (NASDAQ: XEL) provides the energy that powers millions of homes and businesses across eight Western and Midwestern states. Headquartered in Minneapolis, the company is an industry leader in responsibly reducing carbon emissions and producing and delivering clean energy solutions from a variety of renewable sources at competitive prices. For more information, visit xcelenergy.com or follow us on Twitter and Facebook.