‘Make Carbon Dioxide Great Again’ law would ban carbon reduction efforts in Wyoming

Despite overwhelming evidence that human-caused greenhouse gas emissions are the main driver of a climate crisis that threatens to imperil modern life on Earth, some far-right members of the Wyoming Legislature contend it’s a hoax intended to depress the state’s fossil fuel-reliant economy.

Rather than capitulate to out-of-state policies and market forces, the state ought to set an example and outlaw carbon reduction measures altogether — a “bold step forward to lead a balanced, science-based dialogue,” Sen. Cheri Steinmetz (R-Torrington) wrote in a column published by the Cowboy State Daily, announcing Senate File 92, “Make carbon dioxide great again-no net zero.”

The bill is co-sponsored by Freedom Caucus Chairman Emeritus Rep. John Bear, a Republican who represents Gillette, the heart of Wyoming’s coal country. It would declare that “carbon dioxide is not a pollutant and is a beneficial substance,” and codify in Wyoming law that carbon dioxide “not be designated or treated as a pollutant or contaminant.”

Steinmetz, a Senate ally of the House Freedom Caucus, has peddled climate misinformation in the past, most recently during the 2024 legislative session, when she invited representatives of the CO2 Coalition — a group whose climate-denial messaging has been discredited by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and other climate scientists — for unsanctioned testimony and a rally at the Capitol. She also helped lead a Wyoming Freedom Caucus attempt last year to defund an “energy matching funds” program of tens of millions of dollars. The program, under the purview of Gov. Mark Gordon, supports public-private energy initiatives, including some grant recipients that propose low-carbon energy strategies. 

The defunding effort failed.

Fresh off an electoral win this fall, the Freedom Caucus has taken leadership control of the Legislature as lawmakers prepare for the winter session that begins Tuesday. The Steinmetz-Bear-sponsored bill promises to bring climate change denial to the forefront of Wyoming policymaking once again.

“Despite its essential role in sustaining life, CO2 has been demonized as a pollutant,” Steinmetz wrote in a column recently. 

She did not respond to a WyoFile request for comment.

“Our goal in Wyoming, as far as conservative legislators, is to quit depending on who’s in the White House to determine our future,” Bear said in response to a WyoFile question on Tuesday during a Freedom Caucus press conference.

The bill is sure to face opposition from conservation groups, including the Sierra Club Wyoming Chapter.

“The proposed findings in this bill have no basis in reality,” Sierra Club Wyoming Chapter Associate Organizer Emma Jones told WyoFile. “Wyomingites are experiencing the impacts of a changing climate firsthand. We see it in prolonged wildfire seasons, shrinking snowpack in the Tetons and Yellowstone and increasingly unpredictable weather patterns. 

“Ignoring these realities will not make them go away,” Jones added.

What’s in the bill

Senate File 92 would declare that “Carbon dioxide is a foundational nutrient necessary for all life on earth,” according to the bill. “Plants need carbon dioxide along with sunlight, water and nutrients to prosper. The more carbon dioxide available for this, the better life can flourish.”

To that end, the bill would repeal state-imposed mandates directing utilities to retrofit aging coal-fired power plants with carbon capture, use and sequestration technologies instead of retiring the facilities. That policy has already tapped Wyoming ratepayers for millions of dollars to comply with the initiative.

Since 2019, the year Gordon became governor, the Legislature has considered at least 14 bills to impose and refine the mandate, including a provision to potentially force utilities to sell coal plants to another party willing to perform the retrofits. Seven of the bills have become law.

Electric utilities, under SF 92, would have to reimburse their Wyoming customers for state-sanctioned charges to fulfill state-mandated carbon capture, use and sequestration studies. Black Hills Energy and Rocky Mountain Power customers in Wyoming, collectively, are paying about $3 million annually for those initial phases of study. Their Wyoming customers could be on the hook for up to $20 million in fees in coming years, with no guarantee that a single coal plant in the state will ultimately be retrofitted with the technology, according to an estimate by the Wyoming Office of Consumer Advocate.

“Ratepayers — it shouldn’t be their responsibility to pay for a legislative idea to protect the environment that has no sound science behind it,” Bear said. “So we’re out for protecting the ratepayers in Wyoming.”

If passed in its current form, the bill might jeopardize the state’s primacy to oversee the implementation of some federal carbon dioxide regulations, according to the bill’s fiscal note, which is written by legal experts from the Legislative Service Office to help lawmakers gauge the financial implications of new legislation.

The Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality “reports this legislation would end DEQ’s role with underground injection control (UIC) permitting for carbon capture and sequestration projects in Wyoming and that role would go to the [U.S. Environmental Protection Agency],” according to the bill’s fiscal note.

Wyoming worked for years to gain primacy over the federal underground injection control permitting program in hopes of establishing a carbon storage industry in the state.

Reactions

Gordon told reporters on Tuesday he hadn’t yet read SF 92 and could not comment directly on the measure. He reiterated that his Decarbonizing the West initiative, which he developed during his term as chairman of the Western Governors’ Association, underscores his policy vision for addressing climate concerns. It includes not only cutting greenhouse gas emissions, but doing so in a manner that keeps fossil fuels in the mix, he said.

That includes policies and initiatives that utilize carbon dioxide to produce more oil, as well as other potential commercial uses for the gas, he added.

Though several conservation groups support repealing the state’s coal-power-plant carbon capture mandate, SF 92 proponents propose to do so “for all the wrong reasons,” Jones of the Sierra Club said.

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“PacifiCorp [Rocky Mountain Power’s parent company] has already wasted millions of ratepayer dollars evaluating carbon capture at the aging and extremely expensive Jim Bridger plant — money that would have been far better spent on low-cost, clean energy investments that are not subject to volatile fuel prices,” she said. “Wyoming’s leaders need to focus on real, forward-thinking solutions that protect families, lower energy costs and prepare our state for a sustainable future.”

Many Wyomingites — even those who don’t necessarily subscribe to proven human-caused climate change — have said they are alarmed at how changing climate trends, drought and weather extremes threaten their livelihoods and cherished landscapes in the state. Anglers have reported that lower streamflows and warmer stream temperatures — a threat to trout fisheries — seem to arrive earlier in the summer, while some ranchers worry about more intense weather extremes and less season-to-season predictability. The ranching community was particularly hard hit during the summer’s historic wildfire season.

Perhaps one of the most significant climate trends in Wyoming, according to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration data, is that its highest elevations — which serve as a snow and glacial “waterbank” — are warming faster than any other part of the state. That changes the pulse of runoff, which much of the state’s economy was built around, University of Wyoming Department of Geology and Geophysics Professor J.J. Shinker, told WyoFile in 2021.

A coalition of Wyoming electric utilities recently noted changing climate conditions that have contributed to more frequent and intense wildfires across the West in a plea to limit their liability when culpable for sparking a blaze.