Powder River Statement on Arch’s Plans for PRB Mines
“Arch Resources has reaffirmed their commitment to closing their coal mines in the Powder River Basin. The company plans to end production at Coal Creek by the end of the year and is also working to reduce operations at Black Thunder. We again call on the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) to review the […]
Conservation Groups Move to Defend Federal Leasing Pause
This week Powder River Basin Resource Council joined a broad coalition of conservation and tribal groups filing motions to intervene to defend the Department of Interior’s pause on federal oil and gas leasing pending the agency’s comprehensive review of the program. With this action, the groups seek to defend the leasing pause against two lawsuits […]
Powder River Statement on Coal Creek Mine Closure Announcement
In response to Arch Resources’ announcement to close the Coal Creek Mine, Powder River Basin Resource Council’s Chair Marcia Westkott had this statement: “We remain concerned that the reclamation plan is not aligned with the closure date of the mine, and we call on our regulators to ensure timely and effective reclamation at the mine. […]
Powder River Breaks Newsletter January – February 2021
January – February 2021, Volume 49, Number 1 In an effort to demonstrate widespread concern about air quality related to oil and gas development in Laramie County, Cheyenne Area Landowners Coalition (CALC), an affiliate of Powder River, teamed up with Earthworks’ Community Empowerment Project to film several leaking wells with state-of-the-art infrared cameras. The organizations […]
Powder River’s 2020 Annual Report
This is Powder River Basin Resource Council’s 2020 Annual Report. To read the full report, please download the PDF.
Powder River Breaks September – October 2020
September – October 2020, Volume 48, Number 5 They’re baaccck! That’s right, Aethon Energy is back before the Wyoming Oil and Gas Conservation Commission (WOGCC) trying again to get approval for their previously rejected proposal to inject 20,000 barrels per day of polluted oil and gas wastewater from the Moneta Divide field into the Madison […]
New Bill Tackles Unemployment & Abandoned Wells
WASHINGTON, D.C. – These days, skilled workers sit unemployed, while thousands of leaking, orphaned oil and gas wells litter the landscape of the West. An orphaned well is an unreclaimed well for which no owner or operator can be found, or where an owner or operator is unable to plug and reclaim a well. Orphaned […]
Conservation groups: Federal Powder River Basin coal plan violates court order
BLM Plans Govern Coal Mining of 50,000 Acres, 6 Billion Tons of Coal Conservation groups sued the Trump administration today to challenge a massive Powder River Basin coal mining plan that the groups say ignores alternatives to coal, oil and gas leasing and fails to publicly acknowledge the harms from coal combustion, violating federal law […]
Remaining coal mine reclamation could create hundreds of jobs for rural Wyoming
The collapse of the coal industry is devastating small communities across the Western United States, but reclaiming these mined lands quickly could create up to 4,800 full-time equivalent jobs per year in the critical two-to-three-year period after mine closure says a report released today by the Western Organization of Resource Councils (WORC). The report, “Coal […]
Reclaiming & Growing Wyoming’s Future webinar series starts June 17
On Wednesday, June 17 Powder River Basin Resource Council will kick-off its webinar series, Reclaiming & Growing Wyoming’s Future, providing education, tools, and resources available for a planned transition to a new, diversified Wyoming economy. Each session will feature panelists with specific areas of expertise in transitioning resource-dependent communities. In this first webinar, Wyoming’s Reality & […]
