Thousands of solar panels on 10-acre lot hope to help low-income residents

Shuffling through her bills, Saray Alvarado could easily feel stressed.

"My bills got up to be $160 a month, and I'm just like 'Woah!' because I'm on a fixed income," she said.

But these days, she can breathe a sigh of relief thanks to a helping hand with her energy bill.

"It's helped a lot," she said.

Not far from her Denver home sits a 10-acre lot filled with 5,000 solar panels. Each is absorbing Colorado sunshine and cutting down costs.

"It's a 2-megawatt community solar garden that's subscribed by income-qualified customers," explained Tyler Smith of Xcel Energy.

Xcel Energy built the massive Arapahoe Community Solar Garden in a public-private partnership with the city of Denver and nonprofit Energy Outreach Colorado.

"We're standing on what was a former coal plant site, and now we're providing income-qualified customers with renewable energy at an affordable rate," Smith told CBS News Colorado.

The goal is to not only help low-income families with high utility costs but also increase accessibility to more sustainable resources.

"We are particularly interested in a neighborhood like this because there's a high level of low-income families and families that have historically not gotten some of the resources that the city offers," said Wil Aston with the Denver Agency for Human Rights and Community Partnerships. "We are one of the few solar gardens in the country where 100% of the energy that's captured comes right back to this neighborhood."

But the benefit goes beyond access to renewable energy and cost savings. When families can afford to pay their utility bills, that often means they can make healthier decisions.

"When households can't afford their energy bills, they start to make really dangerous decisions," explained Kim Shields of Energy Outreach Colorado. "Things like using unsafe equipment to heat the home or going without food or medicine to try to keep the lights on. Being able to deliver these savings to some of our most vulnerable neighbors -- especially as the winter season approaches - is impactful."

Hundreds of households in the southwest Denver neighborhood near the community solar garden. In some cases, bills are cut by more than half and for residents like Alvarado, it makes a world of difference.

"They care for our community," she said of the program. "They care for our people."

The Arapahoe Community Solar Garden is just the beginning. Xcel Energy says it has plans to build more like it around the state to help more Coloradans make ends meet.