Wyoming communities want time to consider embracing nuclear energy, as feds rush to expand industry

LARAMIE — With one nuclear power plant already under construction, Wyoming will soon be home to high-level nuclear waste storage unless the federal government builds a centralized facility. When TerraPower proposed building its first advanced, liquid sodium-cooled Natrium power plant outside Kemmerer, lawmakers quickly carved out an exception in the state’s otherwise blanket storage ban to allow spent nuclear fuel that comes from any in-state nuclear power plant. But the conversation about nuclear waste storage in the Cowboy State is far from over.

The industry is gearing up for what advocates say is a global nuclear energy revival, and some in Wyoming — including Gov. Mark Gordon, the Wyoming Energy Authority and Wyoming Business Council — are actively recruiting developers. TerraPower is considering more Natrium power plants in the state. Other players have considered setting up nuclear microreactor manufacturing facilities here, which could include storing spent fuel from portable units deployed around the world and returned to the state.

But do Wyoming communities want to crack the door open wider to the industry and, potentially, its radioactive waste? “There’s all this risk, and we’re trying to make sure that those risks are minimized,” said Big Wind Carpenter, a member of the Northern Arapaho tribe. “What is the benefit for the community? I think those are good discussions to start to happen.”

Carpenter, tribal engagement coordinator for the Wyoming Outdoor Council, took part in a nuclear energy forum this week at the University of Wyoming. A major focus was on how to educate and empower communities to decide whether they want the industry in their backyards. That conversation happened very quickly in Kemmerer — from TerraPower announcing its site selection in November 2021 to lawmakers amending the state’s waste storage ban a few months later in 2022. There’s been a series of legislative attempts since to further amend Wyoming’s ban or do away with it completely — all have failed.

Radiant Industries withdrew its proposed nuclear microreactor manufacturing facility from Natrona County in November after a contentious year of trying and failing to get assurances that the state might further loosen its waste storage ban. The episode spurred Gordon to dub opponents — and the far-right Freedom Caucus, in particular — “Club No.”

Such high tensions are a sign of moving too quickly, said Jennifer Richter, who has studied why some communities have chosen to welcome nuclear waste storage while many others have not. It’s a years-long process that cannot be rushed. The federal government has tried for more than 40 years to get buy-in from communities for a central U.S. nuclear waste repository, “and that has not gone particularly well.”

Why can’t the U.S. get comfortable with nuclear waste storage like Finland or Sweden? “It’s because we have a much longer and more complicated history with nuclear,” said Richter, an associate professor at Arizona State University. Lax regulations led to radioactive contamination throughout the American West that resulted in increased cancer rates — pollution that remains unresolved in many cases, including on the Wind River Reservation. The boom-and-bust nature of uranium mining also built many ghost towns, adding to skepticism.

Every type of “advanced” nuclear reactor technology being pursued today has been tested in research settings, said Christine King, director of the Idaho National Laboratory’s Gateway for Accelerated Innovation program. “We’ve tested over 52 experimental reactors over the years at INL,” King said, adding that cooling systems such as liquid sodium and new fuel types are designed to add layers of safety. But whatever the fate of spent nuclear fuel, she said, “These are 100-year relationships you’re going to have with these projects.”

Whether the federal government has the patience that most communities require is another question. Confident in human health and safety technology advancements, the Trump administration has ordered a major overhaul of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, primarily to speed up permitting. The “wholesale revision” of regulations and permitting timelines is moving quickly, said Tison Campbell, a partner at industry market analysis company K&L Gates who previously worked for 19 years at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. “They’re planning to finalize everything by the end of November,” Campbell said, “so there could be a new regulatory regime in place.”

At the same time, Wyoming’s boom-and-bust uranium mining industry is on the upswing with previously idle operations coming back online and new mining projects in the works. The Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality says it is equipped with the staff and institutional knowledge to usher the mining industry’s expansion. But a Converse County resident challenged that confidence, alleging that a wastewater pond at the Smith Ranch-Highland uranium facility is leaking and that state regulators have not fixed the problem despite being aware of it. “If our industry is going to expand,” Maria Katherman said, “and you talk about, ‘How can we convince the public?’ Well, in Converse County, I’m the public, and no amount of regulations on paper are going to convince me.”