Powder River Breaks Newsletter – July – August 2023
July – August 2023, Volume 51, Number 4 After more than half a century of waiting, Powder River, the Western Organization of Resource Councils, and allies applaud the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) for releasing new rules for federal oil and gas wells. The proposed rules will help ensure that federal wells are plugged and […]
Federal court ruling favors Wyoming coal plants, threatening communities and parks
This week the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals sided with polluters in a case that would have reduced air pollution in Wyoming’s national parks and public lands across the region. National Parks Conservation Association, Sierra Club and the Powder River Basin Resource Council have argued in court since 2014 to bring some of the state’s […]
Powder River Breaks Newsletter, May – June 2023
May – June 2023, Volume 51, Number 3 In May, Powder River joined with Western Colorado Alliance (WCA) and Western Organization of Resource Councils (WORC) to advocate for stronger federal onshore oil and gas bonding requirements. The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is considering a rule that would update onshore oil and gas lease sales. […]
New EPA Rule Targets Leaks at Inactive Coal Ash Landfills
Today, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released a revised Coal Combustion Residuals (CCR) rule that no longer exempts inactive impoundments at inactive facilities, also known as “legacy units”. The proposed new rule would address the over half billion tons of coal ash and the decades-old ash ponds that have escaped inspections and leaked toxic chemicals […]
Powder River Basin Resource Council Statement new EPA Power Plant Rules
“While we appreciate the Environmental Protection Agency’s attempts to curb pollution from power plants, we believe they are on the wrong track by encouraging further subsidies and investments in carbon capture (CCS) technology. Carbon capture on coal-fired power plants has proven to be expensive to install and has fallen short in reaching its goals. “There […]
Powder River Breaks Newsletter, March – April 2023
At the end of March, PacifiCorp (which does business as Rocky Mountain Power in Wyoming) released its new 20-year energy plan, detailing what new electricity generation resources the company expects to build and what generation resources it will retire during that timeframe. The plan should largely not be surprising to most who have been following […]
Powder River Breaks Newsletter, November – December 2022
November – December 2022, Volume 50, Number 6 After two years of online annual meetings, we were able to hold our milestone 50th Annual Meeting in person, taking the opportunity to reconnect after two years of COVID and celebrate Powder River’s accomplishments over the last half-century. Rather than an issue-focused meeting, we decided to hold […]
Powder River’s 2022 Annual Report
To read the full report, please download the PDF .
Powder River Breaks Newsletter September – October 2022
September – October 2022, Volume 50, Number 5 Powder River turns a half century old this year! Our founding members joined together in 1973 for the organization’s first annual meeting of the membership, and on Nov. 5 in Sheridan we’ll celebrate the golden anniversary of our annual meetings. The staff and board are excited to […]
Federal court cites human health, climate costs in rejecting coal mining plan
A federal judge late yesterday struck down two U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) resource management plans that failed to address the public health consequences of allowing massive amounts of coal, oil, and gas production from public lands and minerals in the Powder River Basin, including approximately 6 billion tons of low-grade, highly polluting coal […]
