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wyoming
Group That Convinced Wyoming Supreme Court to Block Abortion Ban Fights New Law
"This new law is part of a relentless campaign by anti-abortion extremists who continue to push restrictions regardless of settled law, patient safety, or basic compassion," said one critic.
Mar 11, 2026
A reproductive rights group coalition that recently got two anti-abortion laws overturned in Wyoming's Supreme Court filed a legal challenge on Tuesday against the insidiously named "fetal heartbeat" legislation signed earlier this week by the state's Republican governor.
The advocacy groups Chelsea's Fund and Just the Pill; Wellspring Health Access, Wyoming's only abortion clinic; and three physicians filed a motion seeking to block HB 0126, the so-called Human Heartbeat Act, which was signed Monday by Gov. Mark Gordon.
The law bans abortion when there is a "detectable fetal heartbeat." Critics note that the term "fetal heartbeat" is medically inaccurate and misleading, as what can be detected with a transvaginal ultrasound at around six weeks of gestation is not an actual heartbeat, but rather electrical activity in fetal tissue that later develops into a heart.
The legislation contains an exception to “preserve the woman from an imminent peril that substantially endangers her life or health, according to appropriate medical judgment," but forces victims of rape and incest to carry their abusers' fetus to term.
The “uNfOrTuNaTe fLaW” he's referring to is that the state's abortion ban has no rape or incest exception. 🤬But this is no accident; these policies are DESIGNED to violate our basic human rights. For the extremists who champion these violent laws, this is a feature, not a bug.
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— Center for Reproductive Rights (@reprorights.org) March 11, 2026 at 7:51 AM
Gordon called the glaring lack of exceptions for rape or incest "an unfortunate flaw."
Wyoming's Republican-dominated Legislature passed the law after the state Supreme Court struck down two other pieces of forced-birth legislation in January.
One of the overturned laws outlawed abortion in nearly all cases, except when the pregnant patient’s life is in danger or for victims of rape or incest. The other banned abortion pills. Both laws were passed after the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, reversing half a century of federal abortion rights.
In striking down the laws, the state's high court ruled that they violated residents' ability to make their own healthcare decisions—a right enshrined in the Wyoming Constitution.
The groups challenging the new law echoed the ruling in their motion, arguing the legislation "transgresses the constitutional guarantee of plaintiffs’ and individuals’ to make healthcare decisions without interference from the government."
Chelsea's Fund executive director Janean Forsyth expressed dismay over state lawmakers' relentless attacks on healthcare.
“I'm thinking about everyone from the 15-year-old that we supported, whose grandmother actually reached out, a victim of sexual assault,” Forsyth told Wyoming Public Radio on Wednesday. “I'm thinking about a family with a very wanted pregnancy that we supported in eventually seeking an abortion for a severe fetal anomaly.”
"It's not only affecting access to abortion care, it's affecting reproductive healthcare access generally for parents and children, which is really unfortunate,” she added, referring to medical professionals who are leaving the state for fear of prosecution.
On Wednesday, Brittany Fonteno, president and CEO of the National Abortion Federation (NAF), said in a statement:
A mere two months after two abortion bans were struck down by the state’s Supreme Court, Wyoming’s anti-abortion leaders have enacted yet another ban despite clear judicial rulings and public support for the constitutional right to make personal healthcare decisions. This new law is part of a relentless campaign by anti-abortion extremists who continue to push restrictions regardless of settled law, patient safety, or basic compassion.
“But as they have before, providers are standing firm and fighting back," Fonteno added. "NAF is proud to support Wellspring Health Access and the advocates challenging this ban, and we remain committed to ensuring abortion care is not only legal, but accessible and protected for every person, in every state.”
Abortion access has been tenuous in Wyoming in recent years, with bans and a 2022 arson attack on the Wellspring Health Access clinic in Casper—the state's only full-service abortion facility—causing uncertainty and delays.
Lawmakers in Wyoming considered putting the issue before voters in a referendum but decided against doing so, as such ballot measures have repeatedly resulted in the protection of abortion rights—even in deep "red" and conservative-leaning states including Arizona, Kansas, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, and Ohio.
Wyoming is the fifth state to ban abortion at around six weeks, joining Florida, Georgia, Iowa, and South Carolina.
According to the Guttmacher Institute, 13 states currently have near-total abortion bans, while 28 other states restrict the procedure. Numerous forced-birth bills are pending across the nation, and—while unlikely to pass—the most severe proposals including punishing the medical procedure with lengthy imprisonment and even the death penalty for healthcare providers and patients.
Wyoming’s governor signed into law a so-called “fetal heartbeat” ban. Abortion is now banned in the state when “cardiac activity” is detected, around 6 wks of pregnancy. WY now shifts from “Restrictive” to “Very Restrictive” on our interactive map. Learn more: https://gu.tt/4985P4S#AbortionAccess
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— Guttmacher (@guttmacher.org) March 11, 2026 at 6:00 AM
On Monday, the Center for Reproductive Rights published a report examining the human and economic toll of abortion bans, which a separate study last year by the Population Reference Bureau has linked to 478 excess infant deaths and 59 excess deaths of pregnant people since Roe was struck down nearly four years ago.
It's not only state-level bans that harm patients. Republicans' so-called One Big Beautiful Bill Act, signed into law by President Donald Trump last year, contains the biggest cuts to Medicaid in the program's 60-year history. Dramatically decreased Medicaid funding has resulted in the closure of at least 50 Planned Parenthood clinics nationwide, and the reduction of services at many others.
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Wyoming Supreme Court Strikes Down First US State Ban on Abortion Pills
"Today's ruling affirms what we have always known: that abortion is essential healthcare," said one advocate.
Jan 06, 2026
The first piece of state legislation in the US explicitly banning the use of abortion pills was struck down on Tuesday as Wyoming's state Supreme Court ruled that it, along with the state's near-total abortion ban, violated the state's constitutional right to bodily autonomy.
Both laws were passed in 2023, following the US Supreme Court's overturning of Roe v. Wade. One of them banned abortion in nearly all cases, except when the pregnant patient's life is threatened or in cases of rape or incest—a measure similar to those in several other red states.
But while many states' abortion bans have effectively outlawed the use of abortion drugs like mifepristone and misoprostol, Wyoming's was the first to outlaw the use of these pills in its text.
According to a 2023 study by the Guttmacher Institute, 63% of abortions nationwide are done using medications.
In 2012, Wyoming voters approved a constitutional amendment guaranteeing each competent adult the "right to make his or her own healthcare decisions."
Ironically, the amendment was heavily promoted at the time by conservatives who believed it would protect them from what they viewed as "undue governmental infringement" by former President Barack Obama's Affordable Care Act. But reproductive freedom advocates have since used it as a weapon to protect abortion.
In 2023, Wyoming's only remaining abortion clinic, Wellspring Health Access in Casper; the abortion rights group Chelsea’s Fund; and four women, including two obstetricians, sued the state, arguing that the laws violated this constitutional right.
The state's attorneys attempted to argue that the amendment did not apply to abortion, which they claimed is not "healthcare."
In November 2024, a district judge halted both laws, deeming them unconstitutional. Abortion has since remained legal in the state while the lawsuit went ahead.
In a 4-1 ruling, the Wyoming Supreme Court on Tuesday also sided with abortion rights advocates, ruling that both of these laws conflicted with the state’s constitution.
“A woman has a fundamental right to make her own healthcare decisions, including the decision to have an abortion,” the ruling states.
“The state did not meet its burden of demonstrating the abortion laws further the compelling interest of protecting unborn life without unduly infringing upon the woman’s fundamental right to make her own healthcare decisions,” the court added. “As such, the abortion laws do not constitute reasonable and necessary restrictions on a pregnant woman’s right to make her own healthcare decisions.”
Wyoming’s Supreme Court is the state’s highest judicial authority, meaning that the pair of laws is permanently blocked. However, the court said “lawmakers could ask Wyoming voters to consider a constitutional amendment that would more clearly address this issue.”
Janean Forsyth, the executive director of Chelsea's Fund, said the court's decision "is a landmark victory for reproductive freedom in Wyoming, and we are gratified and heartened by the ruling."
"Today's ruling affirms what we have always known: that abortion is essential healthcare, and Wyoming women have the constitutional right and the freedom to make their own healthcare decisions without government interference," she added.
The ruling is a victory for abortion rights at a time when they have come under systemic attack by the Trump administration during his first year back in power, as the Center for Reproductive Rights documented in a report released Monday.
The administration has withdrawn federal guidance that directed emergency rooms to perform abortions in cases where the mother suffers deadly pregnancy complications, which have increased by as much as 50% in states with abortion bans.
A new policy at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), meanwhile, prevented veterans on VA health insurance from receiving abortions, including in cases of rape, incest, or severe risk to personal health.
The massive cuts to Medicaid under last year's Republican budget reconciliation bill have also resulted in the closure of at least 50 Planned Parenthood health centers across the nation, and reduced services at many more.
GOP attempts to restrict mifepristone access are also currently being litigated in Florida, Texas, and Missouri.
Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr said during a Senate hearing in May that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is currently reviewing its regulations on mifepristone, which was first approved by the FDA 26 years ago. That review has reportedly been delayed until after the 2026 midterm elections in November.
"Too many people wrongly believe that President Trump is done attacking abortion access, and that overturning Roe v. Wade was his endgame,” said Nancy Northup, president and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights. “But in his first year back in office, the Trump administration is not ‘leaving it to the states’ to decide abortion policy, but wielding federal power to go after abortion access even in states where abortion is legal."
She described "the looming fear that the FDA will soon gut access to abortion pills, which have been a lifeline in post-Roe America," adding that "the threat to further limit access to abortion throughout the nation is real and must be met with vigorous opposition.”
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Trump Regulators Ripped for 'Rushed' Approval of Bill Gates' Nuclear Reactor in Wyoming
"Make no mistake, this type of reactor has major safety flaws compared to conventional nuclear reactors that comprise the operating fleet," said one expert.
Dec 03, 2025
A leading nuclear safety expert sounded the alarm Tuesday over the Trump administration's expedited safety review of an experimental nuclear reactor in Wyoming designed by a company co-founded by tech billionaire Bill Gates and derided as a "Cowboy Chernobyl."
On Monday, the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) announced that it has "completed its final safety evaluation" for Power Station Unit 1 of TerraPower's Natrium reactor in Kemmerer, Wyoming, adding that it found "no safety aspects that would preclude issuing the construction permit."
Co-founded by Microsoft's Gates, TerraPower received a 50-50 cost-share grant for up to $2 billion from the US Department of Energy’s Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program. The 345-megawatt sodium-cooled small modular reactor (SMR) relies upon so-called passive safety features that experts argue could potentially make nuclear accidents worse.
However, federal regulators "are loosening safety and security requirements for SMRs in ways which could cancel out any safety benefits from passive features," according to Union of Concerned Scientists nuclear power safety director Edwin Lyman.
"The only way they could pull this off is by sweeping difficult safety issues under the rug."
The reactor’s construction permit application—which was submitted in March 2024—was originally scheduled for August 2026 completion but was expedited amid political pressure from the Trump administration and Congress in order to comply with an 18-month timeline established in President Donald Trump’s Executive Order 14300.
“The NRC’s rush to complete the Kemmerer plant’s safety evaluation to meet the recklessly abbreviated schedule dictated by President Trump represents a complete abandonment of its obligation to protect public health, safety, and the environment from catastrophic nuclear power plant accidents or terrorist attacks," Lyman said in a statement Tuesday.
Lyman continued:
The only way the staff could finish its review on such a short timeline is by sweeping serious unresolved safety issues under the rug or deferring consideration of them until TerraPower applies for an operating license, at which point it may be too late to correct any problems. Make no mistake, this type of reactor has major safety flaws compared to conventional nuclear reactors that comprise the operating fleet. Its liquid sodium coolant can catch fire, and the reactor has inherent instabilities that could lead to a rapid and uncontrolled increase in power, causing damage to the reactor’s hot and highly radioactive nuclear fuel.
Of particular concern, NRC staff has assented to a design that lacks a physical containment structure to reduce the release of radioactive materials into the environment if a core melt occurs. TerraPower argues that the reactor has a so-called "functional" containment that eliminates the need for a real containment structure. But the NRC staff plainly states that it "did not come to a final determination of the adequacy and acceptability of functional containment performance due to the preliminary nature of the design and analysis."
"Even if the NRC determines later that the functional containment is inadequate, it would be utterly impractical to retrofit the design and build a physical containment after construction has begun," Lyman added. "The potential for rapid power excursions and the lack of a real containment make the Kemmerer plant a true ‘Cowboy Chernobyl.’”
The proposed reactor still faces additional hurdles before construction can begin, including a final environmental impact assessment. However, given the Trump administration's dramatic regulatory rollback, approval and construction are highly likely.
Former NRC officials have voiced alarm over the Trump administration's tightened control over the agency, which include compelling it to send proposed reactor safety rules to the White House for review and possible editing.
Allison Macfarlane, who was nominated to head the NRC during the Obama administration, said earlier this year that Trump's approach marks “the end of independence of the agency.”
“If you aren’t independent of political and industry influence, then you are at risk of an accident,” she warned.
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Judge Rules Rocky Mountain Wolves Wrongly Denied Endangered Species Protections
One advocate said the ruling "offers hope that we can restore protections to wolves in the northern Rockies, but only if the federal government fulfills its duty under the Endangered Species Act."
Aug 05, 2025
Conservationists cautiously celebrated a U.S. judge's Tuesday ruling that the federal government must reconsider its refusal to grant protections for gray wolves in the Rocky Mountains, as killing regimes in Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming put the species at risk.
Former President Joe Biden's administration determined last year that Endangered Species Act (ESA) protections for the region's wolves were "not warranted," sparking multiple lawsuits from coalitions of conservation groups. The cases were consolidated and considered by Montana-based District Judge Donald Molloy, an appointee of former President Bill Clinton.
As the judge detailed in his 105-page decision, the advocacy groups argued that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) failed to consider a "significant portion" of the gray wolf's range, the "best available science" on their populations and the impact of humans killing them, and the true threat to the species. He also wrote that "for the most part, the plaintiffs are correct."
Matthew Bishop, senior attorney at the Western Environmental Law Center (WELC), which represented one of the coalitions, said in a statement that "the Endangered Species Act requires the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to consider the best available science, and that requirement is what won the day for wolves in this case."
"Wolves have yet to recover across the West, and allowing a few states to undertake aggressive wolf-killing regimes is inconsistent with the law," Bishop continued. "We hope this decision will encourage the service to undertake a holistic approach to wolf recovery in the West."
Coalition members similarly welcomed Molloy's decision as "an important step toward finally ending the horrific and brutal war on wolves that the states of Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming have waged in recent years," in the words of George Nickas, executive director of Wilderness Watch.
Predator Defense executive director Brooks Fahy said that "today's ruling is an incredible victory for wolves. At a time where their numbers are being driven down to near extinction levels, this decision is a vital lifeline."
Patrick Kelly, Montana director for Western Watersheds Project, pointed out that "with Montana set to approve a 500 wolf kill quota at the end of August, this decision could not have come at a better time. Wolves may now have a real shot at meaningful recovery."
Breaking news! A federal judge in Missoula ruled USFWS broke the law when it denied protections for gray wolves in the western U.S. The agency must now reconsider using the best available science. A major step forward for wolf recovery.Read more: 🔗 wildearthguardians.org/press-releas...
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— Wolf Conservation Center 🐺 (@nywolforg.bsky.social) August 5, 2025 at 3:30 PM
Sierra Club northern Rockies campaign strategist Nick Gevock said that "wolf recovery is dependent on responsible management by the states, and Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming have shown that they're grossly unsuited to manage the species."
Gevock's group is part of a coalition represented by the Center for Biological Diversity and Humane World for Animals, formerly called the Humane Society of the United States. Kitty Block, president and CEO of the latter, said Tuesday that "wolves are deeply intelligent, social animals who play an irreplaceable role in the ecosystems they call home."
"Today's ruling offers hope that we can restore protections to wolves in the northern Rockies, but only if the federal government fulfills its duty under the Endangered Species Act," Block stressed. "These animals deserve protection, not abandonment, as they fight to return to the landscapes they once roamed freely.
While "Judge Molloy's ruling means now the Fish and Wildlife Service must go back to the drawing board to determine whether federal management is needed to ensure wolves survive and play their vital role in the ecosystem," as Gevock put it, the agency may also appeal his decision.
The original rejection came under Biden, but the reconsideration will occur under President Donald Trump, whose first administration was hostile to the ESA in general and wolves in particular. The current administration and the Republican-controlled Congress have signaled in recent months that they intend to maintain that posture.
WELC highlighted Tuesday that Congresswoman Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) "introduced H.R. 845 to strip ESA protections from gray wolves across the Lower 48. If passed, this bill would congressionally delist all gray wolves in the Lower 48 the same way wolves in the northern Rockies were congressionally delisted in 2011, handing management authority over to states."
Emphasizing what that would mean for the species, WELC added that "regulations in Montana, for example, allow hunters and trappers to kill several hundred wolves per year—with another 500-wolf quota proposed this year—with bait, traps, snares, night hunting, infrared and thermal imagery scopes, and artificial light."
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Is Wyoming’s Wind Boom Really Green?
What consequences will these massive renewable energy projects have on biodiversity and the wild creatures that depend on these lands for survival?
Dec 16, 2024
Like many roads that cut through Wyoming, the highway into the town of Rawlins is a long, winding one surrounded by rolling hills, barbed wire fences, and cattle ranches. I’d traveled this stretch of Wyoming many times. Once during a dangerous blizzard, another time during a car-rattling thunderstorm, the rain so heavy my windshield wipers couldn’t keep pace with the deluge. The weather might be wild and unpredictable in Wyoming’s outback, but the people are friendly and welcoming as long as you don’t talk politics or mention that you live in a place like California.
One late summer afternoon on a trip at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, I stopped off in Rawlins for lunch. There wasn’t a mask in sight, never mind any attempt at social distancing. Two men sat in a booth right behind me, one in a dark suit and the other in overalls, who struck me as a bit of an odd couple. Across from them were an older gentleman and his wife, clearly Rawlins locals. They wondered what those two were up to.
“Are you guys here to work on that massive wind farm?” asked the husband, who clearly had spent decades in the sun. He directed his question to the clean-cut guy in the suit with a straight mustache. His truck, shiny and spotless, was visible out the window, a hardhat and clipboard sitting on the dashboard.
“Yes, we’ll be in and out of town for a few years if things go right. There’s a lot of work to be done before it’s in working order. We’re mapping it all out,” the man replied.
“Well, at least we’ll have some clean energy around here,” the old man said, chuckling. “Finally, putting all of this damned wind to work for once!”
I ate my sandwich silently, already uncomfortable in a restaurant for the first time in months.
“There will sure be a lot of wind energy,” the worker in overalls replied. “But none of it’s for Wyoming.” He added that it would all be directed to California.
“What?!” exclaimed the man as his wife shook her head in frustration. “Commiefornia?! That’s nuts!”
Should Wyoming really be supplying California with wind energy when that state already has plenty of windy options?
Right-wing hyperbole aside, he had a point: It was pretty crazy. Projected to be the largest wind farm in the country, it would indeed make a bundle of electricity, just not for transmission to any homes in Rawlins. The power produced by that future 600-turbine, 3,000 MW Chokecherry and Sierra Madre wind farm, with its $5-billion price tag, won’t, in fact, flow anywhere in Colorado, even though it’s owned by the Denver-based Anschutz Corporation. Instead, its electricity will travel 1,000 miles southwest to exclusively supply residents in Southern California.
The project, 17 years in the making and spanning 1,500 acres, hasn’t sparked a whole lot of opposition despite its mammoth size. This might be because the turbines aren’t located near homes, but on privately owned cattle ranches and federal lands managed by the Bureau of Land Management. Aside from a few raised eyebrows and that one shocked couple, not many people in Rawlins seemed all that bothered. Then again, Rawlins doesn’t have too many folks to bother (population 8,203).
Wyoming was once this country’s coal-mining capital. Now, with the development of wind farms, it’s becoming a major player in clean energy, part of a significant energy transition aimed at reducing our reliance on fossil fuels.
Even so, Phil Anschutz, whose company is behind the Chokecherry and Sierra Madre wind farms, didn’t get into the green energy game just to save the climate. “We’re doing it to make money,” admits Anschutz, who got the bulk of his billion-dollar fortune from the oil industry. With California’s mandate to end its reliance on fossil fuels by 2045, he now sees a profitable opportunity, and he’s pulling Wyoming along for the ride.
Since 1988, Wyoming has been the country’s top coal-producing state, but its mining has declined steeply over the past 15 years, as has coal mining more generally in the U.S. where 40% of coal plants are set to be shuttered by 2030. In addition to the closed plants, the downturn in coal output has resulted largely from cheap natural gas prices and the influx of utility-scale renewable energy projects. Wyoming’s coal production peaked in 2008, churning out more than 466 million short tons. Today, its mines produce around 288 million short tons of coal, accounting for 40% of America’s total coal mining and supplying around 25% of its power generation. Coal plants are also responsible for more than 60% of carbon dioxide emissions from the country’s power sector. As far as the climate is concerned, that’s still way too much.
The good news is that the U.S. has witnessed a dramatic drop in daily coal use, down 62% since 2008, and few places have felt coal’s rapid decline more than Wyoming, where a green shift is distinctly afoot. Despite being one of the country’s most conservative states (71% of its voters backed U.S. President-elect Donald Trump this year), Wyoming is going all in on wind energy. In 2023, wind comprised 21% of Wyoming’s net energy generation, with 3,100 megawatts, or enough energy to power more than 2.5 million homes. That’s up from 9.4% in 2007.
The Winds of Change
On the surface, Wyoming’s transition from coal to wind is laudable and entirely necessary. When it comes to carbon emissions, coal is by far the nastiest of the fossil fuels. If climate chaos is to be mitigated in any way, coal will have to become a thing of the past and wind will provide a far cleaner alternative. Even so, wind energy has faced its fair share of pushback. A major criticism is that wind farms, like the one outside Rawlins, are blights on the landscape. Even if folks in Rawlins aren’t outraged by the huge wind farm on the outskirts of town, not everyone is on board with Wyoming’s wind rush.
“We don’t want to ruin where we live,” says Sue Jones, a Republican commissioner of Carbon County. “We can call it renewable, we can call it green, but green still has a downside. With wind, it’s visual. We don’t want to destroy one environment to save another.”
Energy from the Chokecherry and Sierra Madre wind farms will also reach California via a 732-mile transmission line known as the “TransWest Express,” which will feed solar and wind energy to parts of Arizona and Nevada as well. To be completed by 2029, the $3-billion line will travel through four states on public and private land and has been subject to approval by property owners; tribes; and state, federal, and local agencies. The TransWest Express passed the final review process in April 2023 and will become the most extensive interstate transmission line built in the U.S. in decades. As one might imagine, the infrastructure and land required to construct the TransWest Express will considerably impact local ecology. As for the Chokecherry and Sierra Madre wind farm, it might not encroach on residential neighborhoods, but it does risk destroying some of the best natural wildlife habitats in Wyoming.
Transmission towers connecting thick high-voltage power lines will stand 180 feet tall, slicing through prime sage-grouse, elk, and mule deer habitat and Colorado’s largest concentration of low-elevation wildlands. The TransWest Express will pass over rivers and streams, chop through forests, stretch over hills, and bulldoze its way through scenic valleys. Many believe this is just the price that must be paid to combat our warming climate and that the impact of the Chokecherry and Sierra Madre projects, and the TransWest Express, will be nothing compared to what unmitigated climate chaos will otherwise reap. Some disagree, however, and wonder if such expansive wind farms are really the best we can come up with in the face of climate change.
“This question puts a fine point on the twin looming disasters that humanity has brought upon the Earth: the climate crisis and the biodiversity crisis,” argues Erik Molvar, a wildlife biologist and executive director of the Western Watersheds Project, a Hailey, Idaho-based environmental group. “The climate crisis and the biodiversity crisis are of equal importance to humans and every other species with which we share this globe, and it would be foolhardy to ignore either in pursuit of solutions for the other.”
Molver is onto something often overlooked in discussions and debates around our much-needed energy transition: What consequences will these massive renewable energy projects have on biodiversity and the wild creatures that depend on these lands for survival?
Is It Really Clean If It Kills?
Biologists like Mike Lockhart, who worked for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) for more than 30 years, claim that these large wind farms are more than just an eyesore and will negatively affect wildlife in Wyoming. Raptors, eagles, passerines, bats, and various migrating birds frequently collide with the blades, which typically span 165 feet.
“Most of the [Wyoming wind energy] development is just going off like a rocket right now, and we already have eagles that are getting killed by wind turbines—a hell of a lot more than people really understand,” warns Lockhart, a highly respected expert on golden eagles.
In a recent conversation with Dustin Bleizeffer, a writer for WyoFile, Lockhart warned that wind energy development in Wyoming, in particular, is occurring at a higher rate than environmental assessments can keep up with, which means it could be having damning effects on wild animals. Places with consistent winds, as Lockhart explains, also happen to be prime wildlife habitats, and most of the big wind farms in Wyoming are being built before we know enough about what their impact could be on bird populations.
The Department of Energy projects that wind will generate an impressive 35% of the country’s electricity generation by 2050. If so, upwards of 5 million birds could be killed by wind turbines every year.
In February 2024, FWS updated its permitting process under the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act, hoping it would help offset some of wind energy’s effects on eagles. The new rules, however, will still allow eagles to die. The new permits for wind turbines won’t even specify the number of eagles allowed to be killed and companies won’t, in fact, be out of compliance even if their wind turbines are responsible for injuring or killing significant numbers of them.
Teton Raptor Center Conservation Director Bryan Bedrosian believes that golden eagle populations in Wyoming are indeed on the decline as such projects only grow and habitats are destroyed—and the boom in wind energy, he adds, isn’t helping matters. “We have some of the best golden eagle populations in Wyoming, but it doesn’t mean the population is not at risk,” he says. “As we increase wind development across the U.S., that risk is increasing.”
It appears that a few politicians in Washington are listening. In October, Reps. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.) and Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Penn.) introduced a bipartisan bill updating the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918. The legislation would authorize penalties of up to $10,000 per violation for harm to birds. Still, congressional staffers tell me it’s unlikely to pass, given the quiet lobbying efforts behind the scenes by a motley crew of oil, gas, and wind energy developers.
The Department of Energy projects that wind will generate an impressive 35% of the country’s electricity generation by 2050. If so, upwards of 5 million birds could be killed by wind turbines every year. In addition to golden eagles, the American Bird Conservancy notes that “Yellow-billed Cuckoos, Golden-winged Warblers, and Kirtland’s Warblers are particularly vulnerable. Wind energy poses special risks to endangered or threatened species such as Whooping Cranes and California Condors, since the loss of even a few individuals can have population-level effects.”
And bird kills aren’t the only problem either. The constant drone of the turbines can also impact migration patterns, and the larger the wind farm, the more habitat is likely to be wrecked. The key to reducing such horrors is to try to locate wind farms as far away from areas used as migratory corridors as possible. But as Lockhart points out, that’s easier said than done, as places with steady winds also tend to be environments that traveling birds utilize.
Even though onshore wind farms kill birds and can disrupt habitats, most scientists believe that wind energy must play a role in the world’s much-needed energy transition. Mark Z. Jacobson, author of No Miracles Needed and director of the Atmosphere/Energy Program at Stanford University, notes that the minimal carbon emissions in the life-cycle of onshore wind energy are only outmatched by the carbon footprint of rooftop solar. It would be extremely difficult, he points out, to curtail the world’s use of fossil fuels without embracing wind energy.
Scientists are, however, devising novel ways to reduce the collisions that cause such deaths. One method is to paint the blades of the wind turbines black to increase their visibility. A recent study showed that doing so instantly reduces bird fatalities by 70%.
Such possibilities are promising, but shouldn’t wind project creators also do as much as possible to site their energy projects as close to their consumers as they can? Should Wyoming really be supplying California with wind energy when that state already has plenty of windy options—in and around Los Angeles, for example, on thousands of acres of oil and brownfield sites that are quite suitable for wind or solar farms and don’t risk destroying animal habitats by constructing hundreds of miles of power lines?
Wind energy from Wyoming will not finally reach California until the end of the decade. As Phil Anschutz reminds us, it’s all about money, and land in Los Angeles, however battered and bruised, would still be a far cheaper and less destructive way to go than parceling out open space in Wyoming.
Wind Is Still a Resource
In that roadside cafe in Rawlins, the two workers paid their bill and left. I sat there quietly, wondering what that couple made of the revelation that the wind farm nearby wasn’t going to benefit them. Finally, nodding toward the men’s truck as it drove away, I asked, “What do you think of that?”
“Same old, same old,” the guy eventually replied. “Reminds me of the coal industry, the oil industry, you name it. The big city boys come and take our resources and we end up having little to show for it.”
Shortly after lunch, I left Rawlins and made my way two hours north to the Pioneer Wind Farm near the little town of Glenrock that began operating in 2011. I pulled over to get some fresh air and stretch my legs. As I exited the car, I could hear the steady hum of turbines slicing through the air above me and I didn’t have to walk very far before I nearly stepped on a dead hawk in the early stages of decay. I had no way of knowing how the poor critter was killed, but it was hard to imagine that the hulking blade swirling overhead didn’t have something to do with it.
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US Government Sued Over 'Unethical Destruction' of Wolf Population
"The Fish and Wildlife Service is thumbing its nose at the Endangered Species Act and letting wolf-hating states sabotage decades of recovery efforts," said one conservation leader.
Apr 08, 2024
A pair of conservation coalitions on Monday made good on their threats to sue the U.S. government over its denial of federal protections for gray wolves in the northern Rocky Mountains, where state killing regimes "put wolves at obvious risk of extinction in the foreseeable future."
The organizations filed notices of their plans for the lawsuits in early February, after the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) determined that Endangered Species Act protections for the region's wolves were "not warranted." The Interior Department agency could have prevented the suits in the U.S. District Court for the District of Montana by reversing its decision within 60 days but refused to do so.
"The Biden administration and its Fish and Wildlife Service are complicit in the horrific war on wolves being waged by the states of Idaho, Wyoming, and Montana," declared George Nickas, executive director of Wilderness Watch, one of 10 organizations represented by the Western Environmental Law Center (WELC).
"Idaho is fighting to open airstrips all over the backcountry, including in designated wilderness, to get more hunters to wipe out wolves in their most remote hideouts," Nickas noted. "Montana is resorting to night hunting and shooting over bait and Wyoming has simply declared an open season."
"These states are destroying wolf families in the northern Rockies and cruelly driving them to functional extinction via bounties, wanton shooting, trapping, snaring, even running over them with snowmobiles."
Brooks Fahy, executive director of Predator Defense, another WELC group, pointed out that "these states are destroying wolf families in the northern Rockies and cruelly driving them to functional extinction via bounties, wanton shooting, trapping, snaring, even running over them with snowmobiles. They have clearly demonstrated they are incapable of managing wolves, only of killing them."
KC York, founder and president of Trap Free Montana, also represented by WELC, said that "Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming know that they were let off the hook in their brutal and unethical destruction of wolves even acknowledged as such by the service."
"They set the stage for other states to follow," York warned. "We are already witnessing the disturbing onset of giving the fox the key to the hen house and abandoning the farm. The maltreatment is now destined to worsen for these wolves and other indiscriminate species, through overt, deceptive, well-orchestrated, secretive, and legal actions."
The other organizations in the WELC coalition are Alliance for the Wild Rockies, Friends of the Clearwater, International Wildlife Coexistence Network, Nimiipuu Protecting Our Environment, Protect the Wolves, Western Watersheds Project, and WildEarth Guardians.
The second lawsuit is spearheaded by the Center for Biological Diversity, Humane Society of the United States, Humane Society Legislative Fund, and Sierra Club, whose leaders took aim at the same three states for their wolf-killing schemes.
"The states of Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming act like it's 1880 with the most radical and unethical methods to kill as many wolves as possible in an effort to manage for bare minimum numbers," said Sierra Club northern Rockies field organizer Nick Gevock. "This kind of management is disgraceful, it's unnecessary, and it sets back wolf conservation decades, and the American people are not going to stand by and allow it to happen."
"Rather than allow states to cater to trophy hunters, trappers, and ranchers, the agency must ensure the preservation of wolves."
Margie Robinson, staff attorney for wildlife at the Humane Society of the United States, stressed that "under the Endangered Species Act, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service cannot ignore crucial scientific findings. Rather than allow states to cater to trophy hunters, trappers, and ranchers, the agency must ensure the preservation of wolves—who are vital to ensuring healthy ecosystems—for generations to come."
The Center for Biological Diversity's carnivore conservation program director, Collette Adkins, was optimistic about her coalition's chances based on previous legal battles, saying that "we're back in court to save the wolves and we'll win again."
"The Fish and Wildlife Service is thumbing its nose at the Endangered Species Act and letting wolf-hating states sabotage decades of recovery efforts," Adkins added. "It's heartbreaking and it has to stop."
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Groups to Sue Feds for Refusing to Protect Wolves in Western US
"The current killing regimes in Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming put wolves at obvious risk of extinction in the foreseeable future, and this core population is key to wolf survival in the West."
Feb 07, 2024
Two coalitions of conservation groups on Wednesday filed notices of their intent to sue the U.S. government for not granting federal endangered or threatened species protections to gray wolves in the northern Rocky Mountains or across the western United States.
The notices, sent to U.S. Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland and Fish and Wildlife Service Director Martha Williams, give the FWS 60 days to change its finding that Endangered Species Act (ESA) protections for the region's wolves are "not warranted," or face two lawsuits. The agency's finding was
announced last week and published in the Federal Register Wednesday.
Since a congressional legislative rider and court battles stripped the area's wolves of ESA protections over a decade ago, states have stepped up their killing efforts while local and national groups have fought to protect the animals—including with a pair of petitions calling on FWS to reconsider the issue, which led to the service's latest finding.
"It's beyond frustrating that federal officials are harming wolf recovery by denying wolves in the northern Rockies the powerful federal protections they deserve," declared Andrea Zaccardi, carnivore conservation legal director at the Center for Biological Diversity, which has partnered with the Humane Society of the United States, Humane Society Legislative Fund, and the Sierra Club.
"Unlike the Fish and Wildlife Service, we refuse to sanction the annual slaughter of hundreds of wolves."
"Unlike the Fish and Wildlife Service, we refuse to sanction the annual slaughter of hundreds of wolves," she continued. "Allowing unlimited wolf killing sabotages decades of recovery efforts in the northern Rockies, as well as those in neighboring West Coast and southern Rockies states."
Nick Gevock, Sierra Club field organizer for the northern Rockies, specifically called out FWS for failing to recognize the impacts of policies in Idaho and Montana, asserting that "the regimens these states have pursued are reminiscent of the 1800s effort to eradicate wolves, and they have no place in modern wildlife management."
In recent years, Montana legislators have
advanced various measures opposed by conservationists and experts, including a "bounty program" law to reimburse hunters and trappers for their expenses. In Idaho, the state can use taxpayer money to hire private contractors to kill wolves, and there is no limit on how many wolf tags hunters can obtain.
"Nearly 30 years after wolves were reintroduced to Yellowstone National Park, wolves in the region are once again in danger of extinction," said Margie Robinson, staff attorney for wildlife at the Humane Society of the United States. "The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service must make decisions that protect precious native wildlife for generations to come, rather than allowing states to cater to trophy hunters, trappers, and ranchers."
Yellowstone stretches across parts of Idaho and Montana but is largely in Wyoming, which has come under fire for designating gray wolves as "predatory animals" across much of the state, meaning they can be killed without a license.
Members of the coalition represented by the Western Environmental Law Center (WELC) also blasted all three states' policies. Erik Molvar, a wildlife biologist and executive director of the Western Watersheds Project, warned that "the current killing regimes in Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming put wolves at obvious risk of extinction in the foreseeable future, and this core population is key to wolf survival in the West."
Both coalitions argue that the FWS ignored "the best available science" and should not rely on the states' wolf tallies. Molvar said that "even if the states' population estimates were defensible—and they aren't, according to recent scientific analyses—the feds are underestimating the extinction agendas of anti-wolf state governments and the small and tentative state of recovering wolf populations elsewhere in the West."
Brooks Fahy, executive director of Predator Defense, also part of the WELC coalition, stressed that "Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming have become the poster children for what happens when politics trumps science."
"They are cruelly driving wolves in the northern Rockies to extinction via wanton shooting, trapping, snaring, even driving over them with a snowmobile," Fahy said. "Science shows us the importance of intact pack structures. Each family member has a vital role to play and they grieve each loss."
Joining the Molvar and Fahy's groups are the Alliance for the Wild Rockies, Friends of the Clearwater, International Wildlife Coexistence Network, Nimiipuu Protecting Our Environment, Protect the Wolves, Trap Free Montana, WildEarth Guardians, and Wilderness Watch.
"It's deeply concerning to hear that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has decided not to list gray wolves, a sacred species to Native Americans in the western U.S., under the Endangered Species Act, while ignoring traditional sacred religious beliefs of traditional Native Americans," said Roger Dobson of Protect the Wolves.
"It's important to protect these intelligent and family-oriented predators to maintain ecosystem health, and to protect Native American sacred religious beliefs," Dobson added. "Hopefully, the service will take steps to address the problems with their determination before it's too late for these native wildlife species, before violating Indigenous religious beliefs."
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Green Groups Defend Biden Decision to Delay Oil and Gas Drilling Leases
"The energy sector should be looking to the future of justly sourced renewable energy, not pushing outdated technology that exploits people and the planet."
Feb 08, 2023
More than a dozen groups intervened in a case in Wyoming on Wednesday to defend the Biden administration's decision to postpone the sale of oil and gas leases in the state, arguing that numerous court ruling and settled laws have affirmed the U.S. Interior Department is free to determine when such sales will go forward—or whether they will at all.
The legal groups Earthjustice and the Western Environmental Law Center are representing 17 national and local groups in the case, in which the state of Wyoming and two industry trade groups sued the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in December over its postponement of sales that had been planned for 2021 and 2022.
The BLM currently has several sales scheduled for 2023, covering nearly half a million acres, but as Friends of the Earth (FOE) said in a press statement Wednesday, the groups "want the court to order the Department of the Interior (DOI) and the BLM to hold lease sales every three months across the West"—despite warnings from energy experts and scientists that fossil fuel extraction must be phased out in order to avoid the worst effects of the climate emergency.
"Today's filing demonstrates that we refuse to sit back and allow Big Oil to push for policies that perpetuate dirty energy," said Hallie Templeton, legal director for FOE. "The law is crystal clear: the federal government holds broad authority over whether, when, and how to lease public lands for oil and gas development. The energy sector should be looking to the future of justly sourced renewable energy, not pushing outdated technology that exploits people and the planet."
FOE is joined by groups including the Sierra Club, the Wilderness Society, Citizens for a Health Community, and the Western Organization of Resource Councils in defending the Biden administration's decision.
A U.S. District Court ruling in Wyoming in September 2022 affirmed that the administration can postpone the sales, and the U.S. Supreme Court has also ruled that the agencies "have broad discretion to determine the timing and scope of lease sales, including not holding them at all," FOE said in the press statement.
Bob LeResche, a Powder River Basin Resource Council board member and chair of the Western Organization of Resource Councils, noted that the industry has already "stockpiled" more than 9,000 approved federal drilling permits.
"Forcing Interior to lease without fully weighing public impacts is industry’s attempt to continue looting public resources by accumulating excess leases at bargain basement prices," said LeResche. "The industry could continue drilling and producing as normal for decades even with no new leases."
The postponement represents a correction of BLM's longtime practice of "blindly" leasing public lands for oil and gas drilling "without actually understanding the impacts of development," said Peter Hart, an attorney with Wilderness Workshop.
"Now the agency is working to reevaluate its oil and gas management and to assess impacts, like those that new development will have on the climate," he added. "It just makes sense to pause new leasing until the program is brought into this century, and it is well within the agency’s authority."
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Green Groups Want Ruling on Wyoming Fossil Fuel Leases to Embolden Biden
"We hope that moving forward, the Biden administration won't shy away from exercising its authority to limit oil and gas leasing in order to protect our climate and the environment."
Sep 02, 2022
A coalition of 21 green groups on Friday welcomed a U.S. judge's ruling rejecting a challenge by Wyoming and the fossil fuel industry to the Biden administration not holding oil and gas lease sales early last year.
"We are pleased to see this well-reasoned order in such an important case," the groups--which were represented by Earthjustice and the Western Environmental Law Center (WELC), and defended the administration's postponements and leasing pause--said in a statement.
"We hope that moving forward, the Biden administration won't shy away from exercising its authority to limit oil and gas leasing in order to protect our climate and the environment," the coalition added.
The industry petitioners filed their suit on January 27, 2021--the day of newly inaugurated President Joe Biden's relevant executive order--and updated their petition in February and again in March. Wyoming launched its case on March 24, 2021.
Given the timing of both petitions in the consolidated case, Wyoming-based U.S. District Judge Scott W. Skavdahl considered whether the industry petitioners and state have the standing to challenge Department of the Interior (DOI) leasing actions related to either the first or second quarter of last year.
Skavdahl concluded that industry petitioners lack standing to challenge DOI moves beyond the initial filing date "because such later action is not necessarily 'final agency action' at the time their standing is determined." He similarly ruled that the state "lacks standing to challenge anything beyond the first-quarter lease sale postponements."
The judge further found that the administrative record shows the first-quarter lease sale postponements "were not arbitrary, capricious, or an abuse of discretion," and did not violate the Federal Land Policy and Management Act, Mineral Leasing Act, or National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA).
In fact, he noted, "substantial evidence in record supports the DOI secretary's decision to postpone the March 2021 lease sales over concerns that the associated environmental assessments did not satisfy recent federal court caselaw that had found similar EAs lacked sufficient NEPA analysis."
Skavdahl's ruling comes after U.S. District Judge Terry Doughty last month doubled down on his 2021 decision to block Biden's oil and gas leasing moratorium. Doughty's new injunction does not impact Wyoming--it only applies to the 13 states involved in the case: Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Texas, Utah, and West Virginia.
That recent move by Doughty--an appointee of former President Donald Trump--came just a day after Judge Patrick E. Higginbotham of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit struck down his 2021 nationwide injunction, concluding that it lacked necessary specificity.
While the recently signed Inflation Reduction Act is set to force more fossil fuel lease sales for federal lands and waters, climate campaigners continue to pressure the president to end the extraction of oil and gas from such spaces.
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GOP House Nominee in Wyoming Called Coal 'Clean' Energy That 'We All Should Be Using'
Harriet Hageman has a "record of anti-conservation, anti-government zealotry that once earned her the nickname 'Wicked Witch of the West' among environmentalists—a title she embraced."
Aug 17, 2022
Wyoming's Republican voters on Tuesday nominated for the U.S. House a right-wing attorney who has spent decades combating regulations aimed at preserving her state's lands and waters from fossil fuel exploitation.
Harriet Hageman cruised to victory in Wyoming's at-large House district, benefiting from widespread right-wing anger at incumbent Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) over her vote to impeach former President Donald Trump in 2021 and her decision to serve as vice chair of the House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
The former president endorsed Hageman, an ex-Cheney ally who in 2016 called Trump "somebody who is racist and xenophobic" and attempted to thwart his nomination during that year's Republican National Convention.
Hageman now disowns her previous statements on Trump, claiming she was led astray by "the lies the Democrats and Liz Cheney's friends in the media were telling at the time."
"Absolutely the election was rigged," Hageman said on the campaign trail, echoing the former president's lie about the 2020 election. "What happened in 2020 is a travesty."
The GOP nominee advances to face Democratic pick Lynnette Grey Bull, a renewable energy advocate who is vying to become the first Indigenous person to win a U.S. House seat representing Wyoming, which produces a large percentage of the nation's coal.
"It's definitely a David and Goliath type of campaign," said Grey Bull, who states on her website that "coal, oil, and gas are not viable energy sources in the long-term, environmentally or economically."
By contrast, Hageman--who is heavily favored to win in November--has been described as an "anti-conservation zealot" given her years as a trial lawyer fighting environmentalists in court and her expressed disdain for the very idea of protected federal lands. The oil and gas industry was among the corporate interests that helped fund her campaign against Cheney, who was also a vocal supporter of fossil fuel development during her three House terms.
"For three decades, Hageman has been sparring with environmentalists, suing federal agencies over land use decisions, and advocating for transferring control of federal lands to states," HuffPost's Chris D'Angelo recently reported. "It is a record of anti-conservation, anti-government zealotry that once earned her the nickname 'Wicked Witch of the West' among environmentalists--a title she embraced."
"Come next year," D'Angelo warned, "Hageman could be Wyoming's new at-large congresswoman and, if she has it her way, a member of the House committee with jurisdiction over energy development, public lands, and wildlife."
In a December appearance on former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon's podcast, Hageman boasted, "I've taken on the EPA, I've taken on the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, I've taken on the USDA."
Hageman is currently listed as a senior litigation attorney on the website of the New Civil Liberties Alliance, a right-wing legal group that opposes climate regulations. As the New York Times notes, her "most far-reaching case" as a trial lawyer "was a successful challenge of Clinton-era federal regulations to protect millions of acres of National Forests from road-building, mining, and other development."
Unlike her position on Trump, Hageman's support for fossil fuel extraction and opposition to federal land, water, and endangered species protections has not wavered.
"At a luncheon last week for the Chamber of Commerce of Rock Springs, a community built on fossil-fuel extraction, Ms. Hageman promised to be a champion in Washington for those industries if elected," the Times reported Tuesday. "And she warned that Democrats' climate and tax bill would be 'devastating' to Wyoming, after stating that coal was an 'affordable, clean, acceptable resource that we all should be using.'"
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