ALBUQUERQUE — The woman who heads New Mexico's largest electric utility worries there's no public policy debate under way about the direction utilities should take at a time when costs are going up and the economy is stalled.

Patricia Vincent-Collawn also said Americans haven't decided whether to return to nuclear energy. Meanwhile, she said we're arguing over clean coal and unsure exactly what to do about renewable energy.

There's also the problem of making people understand electric rates will go up because of an aging utility system, stricter environmental controls and legislation to lower carbon emissions.

"People don't spend a lot of time thinking about their electricity and where it comes from and what they're willing to pay," Vincent-Collawn said.

It's the challenge of communicating those messages that the president and chief executive of PNM Resources loves about the utility business.

She has overseen the parent company of Public Service Company of New Mexico since March 1 but still hasn't found time to hang pictures on the wall of her eighth-floor office.

"That hasn't been a priority," Vincent-Collawn said.

Rather, she's focused on PNM's issues: environmental concerns about coal-fired power plants in northwestern New Mexico, a massive rate case before state regulators, capital costs that take up much of the company's budget and a poor credit rating.

PNM, which serves 51 percent of New Mexico's retail electricity customers, filed for a rate increase in June that would add $14 to the average bill over two years, a 21 percent hike. The company has raised rates for some customers by 24 percent over the past three years.

The utility has spent about $500 million on maintenance, repair and improvements since 2008, and Vincent-Collawn said current rates do not fully recover those costs and the cost of borrowing.

Vincent-Collawn, who has a Master of Business Administration from Harvard University, joined PNM in 2007 after stints with Public Service Company of Colorado, Arizona Public Service Company, Price Waterhouse and Quaker Oats Co.

She moved from consulting work for Price Waterhouse in Phoenix into utilities when a friend recruiting for Arizona Public Service asked what she knew about electricity.

"I said, 'Well, I flip the switch and the light goes on and I pay my bill every month.' And they said, 'That's what we want,' because they wanted people who had more of a customer point of view." Many people in the utility industry, she said, have been engineers or accountants.

How does someone make a transition from being a customer to leading New Mexico's largest electric utility?

"I read a lot," Vincent-Collawn said. "I was very lucky that people were very good to me and helped me learn what I needed to know. I made a fool of myself occasionally, and you're just going to have to pick yourself up after you get done."

She also said her bachelor's degree in journalism from Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa, has been handy because "I know how to ask questions."

The degree has other uses: "Everybody hates to send me stuff because my job is to find the stray comma."




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