Powder River Basin Resource Council

Powder River Basin Resource Council's (Powder River) mission statement remains the guiding principle for our work: the preservation and enrichment of Wyoming's agricultural heritage and rural lifestyle. The conservation of Wyoming's unique land, mineral, water, and clean air resources consistent with responsible use of those resources to sustain the livelihood of present and future generations. The education and empowerment of Wyoming's citizens to raise a coherent voice in the decisions that will impact their environment and lifestyle. Powder River was founded in 1973 by rural landowners of north east Wyoming working to protect their land, water, and air from the ravages of coal strip mining, Powder River currently has members throughout Wyoming and several other states. In 2021 there were six local community groups throughout Wyoming that are affiliated with Powder River. Powder River Basin Resource Council is the only group in Wyoming that actively addresses agricultural as well as energy and conservation issues. The group unites both individuals with strong conservation convictions and ranchers and farmers with a strong land stewardship ethic around a shared vision to protect and improve Wyoming's quality of life. Also, Powder River is the only group that addresses split estate and private property rights in addition to public land issues. Powder River members write editorials and letters-to-the-editor regarding the issues we address, which are then published in local and statewide newspapers as well as online news sites. Powder River publishes the Powder River breaks on a bimonthly basis from january/ february to november/december of each year. This eight-to- twelve-page newsletter contains information on the issues and projects undertaken by Powder River. It is provided to members and is available to the public at libraries across the state and other designated drop sites. Powder River maintains a website at www.powderriverbasin.org that informs and educates the public on conservation issues that the organization addresses. Powder River also has a youtube channel where our educational events and videos are available. We also maintain a library in our office containing historical and current documents related to water, land, sustainable agriculture, and Resource development issues at our office based in sheridan. Powder River's work is overseen by the board of directors. Board members are elected from and by the Powder River membership for a two-year term. As a grassroots organization, members decide the direction and focus of Powder River's work. Members bring resolutions for a vote of membership approval at the annual meeting that is held annually in november and is open to the public. Every year a keynote speaker or panel provides insights and information on selected issues and is open to questions from the audience that normally ranges from 90 - 150 people. In 2021, due to the ongoing covid pandemic, our 49th annual meeting was held online via zoom with a business meeting for Powder River members and a keynote speaker who spoke on reimagining Wyoming: buffalo, sustainability & transformation. Every year Powder River also sponsors awards at the Wyoming state science fair for science projects that promote conservation and education on the prairie ecosystems of Wyoming. The youth in conservation awards are a cash award to selected participants in the Wyoming state science fair whose projects meet the criteria for the award. These awards honor students whose science fair projects study Wyoming ecosystems, consider impacts of development on the natural environment or our agricultural heritage, or explore innovative energy alternatives. The winners in 2021, selected by Powder River board members, were: laramie middle school student padmalakshmi ramesh for her computer science project "application of data science & visualization concepts for analyzing patterns in Wyoming wildfire data;" shanti junker of lander middle school whose project "moving, mobbing, mowing,- and makaila merriam of meadowlark elementary school in cheyenne for her project "effect of acid rain on germination." Each winner received was awarded 250. In 2021, Powder River's continued efforts to increase consumer access to local foods. We developed postcards which were sent to over 600 supplemental nutrition assistance program (snap) recipients to let them know their snap benefits are accepted at the downtown sheridan farmers' market. We also maintained the sheridan seed library at the sheridan county fulmer library through high-demand for seeds due to the ongoing pandemic. We continued supporting the sheridan food forest, which is a public source of food as well as habitat for native pollinators, and hosted a successful picnic on the pathway in august where children were presented with a variety of hands-on science activities. We remained active the Wyoming food coalition, which is working to unite the local foods community throughout the state. Powder River worked to help farmers and ranchers interested in regenerative agriculture by hosting building soils for fat cows and ranch profits, a webinar on practical tips to regenerative agriculture for cattle ranching. We also started a rancher to rancher support group for regenerative agriculture to help producers connect and share information. The coal industry's downward spiral that started years ago continued in 2021 with mine production and employment remaining low. Powder River continues to be the voice of the public interest to ensure the best possible protection for our land and people as the industry winds down. We continued our multi-year campaign to ensure reclamation bonds are available to cover the full cost of repairing the land of water after mining. In 2021, more mines replaced risky "self-bonds" with third-party surety bonds, and now no Wyoming mines are self-bonded. We continued our partnerships with allied groups in appalachia and other coal regions to focus on common problems in coal mine reclamation and bankruptcy. We met with officials federal agencies about these key reforms that are needed by coal communities. Powder River continues to push for the retirement of polluting and uneconomic coal plants despite the state's efforts to keep them open using expensive and unproven carbon capture technology. We also launched the Wyoming ratepayers association to advocate transitioning from higher- cost coal generation to lower-cost renewable energy. In 2021, Powder River continued working for a just and equitable energy transition in southwest Wyoming. We continued our webinar series, reclaiming and growing Wyoming's future with three more webinars focusing on the changing workforce, resources for tough times, and the value of a wellness sector. We also launched Wyoming voices, a storytelling project aimed at shifting the narrative around the energy transition. In 2021, Powder River's organizing and campaign work around oil and gas development impacts continued to focus on protecting Wyoming's freshwater resources, reducing air pollution to protect public health and safety, and pushing to ensure reclamation and plugging of orphan oil and gas wells. We worked with our cheyenne affiliate, cheyenne area landowners coalition, and earthworks' community empowerment project to film several leaking wells in laramie county with a state-of-the-art infrared camera. We also worked to strengthen federal air quality regulations and advocated for federal oil and gas leasing and bonding reform. We continued to protect our aquifers from being polluted with produced oil and gas wastewater. Our 2021 renewable energy work built upon our previous work in laramie where our affiliate, alliance for renewable energy (are), formed a joint taskforce to tackle laramie-area emissions and make progress toward the city's 2050 carbon-free goal. Are organized a solar tour of the community featuring public and private solar energy arrays, as well as residential and commercial systems. Are also supported the city of laramie in installing its inaugural solar energy project. Our sheridan area affiliate also continued talks with the local utility about building a community solar project. We were also involved with the formation of the energy and environment intergovernmental taskforce in lander. Much like our work in laramie, this group is working to decrease the community's emissions and promote investments in renewable energy.