Wyoming may be small in people, but it’s big in energy ambition.
From fossil fuels to renewables and nuclear, Wyoming’s energy potential far outweighs its size. Its population of around 587,000 makes it the nation’s smallest state, but Wyoming’s wide open spaces hold immense untapped resources, including coal, oil, natural gas, uranium and a host of other rare earth minerals.
Gov. Mark Gordon thinks this land of ropers and ranchers can ride forward into a new energy future while keeping its rugged cowboy roots intact.
The son of ranchers, Gordon was raised on family land near Kaycee in the grasslands of the Powder River Basin. He worked in the oil and gas business, including a stint with Raymond Plank at Apache Corp., before entering politics in 2012 as state treasurer. Gordon was elected governor in 2018 and re-elected in 2022.
Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon. Wyoming’s wide-open spaces hold immense untapped resources, including coal, oil, natural gas, uranium and a host of other rare-earth minerals, Gordon told Hart Energy in an exclusive interview. (Source: State of Wyoming)
The experience in oil and gas gives him insight in a state with immense energy potential. Wyoming remains the nation’s top producer of coal. The state has eight of the 10 largest U.S. coal mines, according to Energy Information Administration data.
Horizontal development is reigniting the Powder River oil play, pushing production upward after the COVID-19 slump. Oil production is being led by Anschutz Exploration Corp., EOG Resources, Continental Resources, Devon Energy and Occidental Petroleum.
Natural gas opportunities in the southwest part of the state, including the Green River Basin and Pinedale Field, are attracting investment.
Wind power sweeps through Wyoming’s mountain gaps and high prairies, making it one of the top wind resource states in the U.S.
TerraPower, founded by Bill Gates, is building its first advanced nuclear power plant, the Natrium reactor, near Kemmerer, Wyoming, next to a retiring coal facility.
Gordon met with Hart Energy Senior Editor Chris Mathews in Casper, Wyoming, in June for a wide-ranging interview about Wyoming’s energy landscape.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Chris Mathews: How would you describe Wyoming’s current energy landscape? How important is coal still to the state’s economy?
Mark Gordon: I would say that Wyoming is a land of opportunity. There are circumstances around each of the resources, but I think there’s opportunity in each of them. Let me start a little bit with coal, in which we’re the No. 1 producer. There’s been a decline over time. I think there’s a recognition that’s shown up in the last couple of years of the Biden administration that said, “Oh, wait a minute. It’s less expensive to have base power here. A lot of it is in place, and what can we do to be able to make sure that we continue to have some reliable power going forward?”
We’ve embraced that. Wyoming’s coal became a valuable resource for the country because of the low-sulfur content and acid rain issues and so on. This coal is particularly precious in the future energy mix. Domestically, we believe it has an important future. It’s relatively cheaper to mine. The constraints we have are around our transportation, but I think it’s at least 23 states that we currently supply.
Our challenge is: how do we give better value to it, and what are the technologies that can be brought to bear? I’m under a little bit of pressure because people are saying, “Well, you’re just making it more expensive and we don’t need that.” Who knows what happens with changes in administrations over time. We’ve sort of ping-ponged back and forth over the last probably 30 years on whether we need more coal, less coal, more coal, less coal. And our point is—we’re going to need coal. We need to learn how to burn it more efficiently. That’s just progress, and we’ll continue to try to be a leader in that respect.
CM: What is the outlook for oil and gas development in Wyoming compared to other major basins?
MG: Oil and gas, we have some really interesting new shale plays here. Our costs are going to be higher than the Permian, which is why New Mexico has blown into No. 2, and Texas is doing so well. And it’s just really hard to beat the Permian. It’s a hell of a resource. The company I used to work for, Apache, got into the Permian a long, long time ago, and … the dynamics are remarkable. The Bakken also has a pretty remarkable run on it.
But we’re, what, 15 rigs now? You compare that to pre-COVID levels—33. It is a little daunting, but I think we’re coming back. We’re starting to see new rigs come in. And as you know, if you’re going to start to develop a play, there’s mobilization costs and all of those things. So, what affects that [breakeven] price?
I think probably everybody knows how chaotic the situation is now. It is interesting because, talking to my old friends in the industry, there was a lot of optimism from the Trump administration and its energy dominance mandate. There’s a little bit of concern about what that means on tariffs and for tubing and other things that are coming in. So, all of that equation, I think, makes it a little bit difficult. But it’s exciting that we have people that are coming in and saying, “We see a future in the Powder River Basin.” The gas plays down in the southwest are other areas that we are particularly interested in.
We’ve learned more about the Niobrara and the relative maturities of some of these different shales. I know a local producer here that says they’re on the verge of really understanding this a lot better, and it’ll become even more productive if we can start sharing some information.
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CM: What can be done to reduce development costs in the Powder River Basin and attract more rig activity?
MG: We used to have [the major oilfield services providers] here. As things evolved and changed, it takes a lot [for industry] to come back in.
We had an administration that was saying the place we’re going to stop [oil and gas development] is going to be Wyoming. Michelle Lujan Grisham, the governor of New Mexico, and I were constantly going, “Look, by saying you’re not going to do anything on our federal lands, all you’re doing is moving production to Texas or somewhere else. You’re not slowing down any of this, [or getting a] perceived environmental benefit that you’re hoping to accrue. So, stop it.”
It may have resonated with [Grisham]—my gosh, they’ve exploded there in the Permian.
But for us, we still had [issues in] Converse County. You have everything done. You have the [Environmental Impact Study EIS)] done, it’s all ready to go. And then something that gets held up, almost three years after the decision.
If ostensibly you’re trying to do this for environmental reasons, there’s no state that’s done a better job. My staff has been working on the sage grouse habitat protections for years. We solved that a long, long time ago.
No other states are trying to follow us in terms of migration corridors. We decided that rather than drawing spaghetti on a sheet of paper, that we’d go to the people and say, “Hey, this is an important thing. How can we work with you?”
And guess what—it’s the operators that are supporting that. They’re the ones that are putting all the money in behind the studies and other things that are making that happen. There’s real collaboration here, and our state can pivot probably faster than almost anybody else.
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CM: Talk more about the natural gas plays, like the Green River Basin. What opportunities do you see for natural gas?
MG: Particularly for natural gas, if that can be turned to LNG, that becomes an interesting source of export for us. Just yesterday, we had the Japanese Consul General and several companies that we spoke with on a trade mission. All of them were very interested because of those tariffs. So, it’s not all bad because of those tariffs. We visited with Taiwan and Japan, both extremely interested in trying to reduce their trade deficits.
Easy way to do it: They don’t have that much production. They do have some renewables, but they’ve got that pretty much at capacity, almost saturated. So, “We need energy. We haven’t got a lot of friends around us. We’d love to work with the U.S. on that. And more than that, we can help invest in some of that infrastructure.”
I’d say the other thing that I think is going to put us in a different class and give us a bit of a competitive advantage is something we heard while we were on the trade mission. You’ve got Taiwan and you’ve got Japan—we haven’t been to Korea yet, but my suspicion is probably similar.
They all seem to have 2050 net zero goals, so they’re still very much interested in reducing their carbon footprint. We have the only gas in the country that can meet those requirements to be able to get carbon credits. And in fact, some of that is being sent out to California now.
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CM: What do you think of the new Trump administration’s approach to energy policy so far?
MG: Congress moves very slowly and there’s some disappointment just in the fact that we haven’t seen quite the momentum that we started with. It’s kind of stalled a little bit, and that’s a frustration—but not with this administration.
I will say early on, as soon as the election occurred, talking to [Interior Secretary] Doug Burgum, former governor of North Dakota and a very close friend, about all the things that are particularly problematic to us. As he referred to it, the “little gifts” that the Biden administration gave us: the Rock Springs [Resources Management Plan (RMP)], the Buffalo RMP, sage grouse, all these little tidbits that were intended to finalize some of that “We don’t like fossil” approach to life that you saw right at the beginning.
I think the very first thing was the Rock Springs RMP and the secretarial order. All of those things came back to slow that stuff down. We’ve just reopened the process on the Rock Springs RMP.
Just to make it clear, there was a tremendous amount of engagement on Rock Springs. In fact, that spans about a dozen years of engagement on that RMP alone, really an excellent and inclusive process. We had a task force. There was a tremendous amount of public testimony. There were some good decisions that came out of that, but there were other areas that just fell out of favor, even valid and existing rights. Although theoretically they could be developed, it was really almost impossible to get to them.
When that record of decision came out, it pretty much ignored my consistency review almost entirely. But all that stuff was really current. So, for us, it was important to get a plan amendment underway as quickly as we could, largely because we wanted to make sure the public comment was represented, because we wanted to make sure the good work wasn’t lost just in an ideological agenda. That is opening at this moment, which is exciting. Similar things are going on with Buffalo. That’s been a great engagement from this administration.
Obviously, I stood next to Donald Trump at his coal [event] signing all those executive orders that day. It’s exciting to have that happen with coal miners there and others, just sort of unleashing American energy. All of that’s good, but it just takes time.
I’m very hopeful that we start to get people confirmed. We’ve had the secretaries confirmed, but that next level down is taking longer. We don’t have a BLM director. We have an acting one, but that’s different than a permanent director. Our former [Wyoming Game and Fish Department] director is nominated for U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. That’s important for all kinds of things, like sage grouse. Other [nominees] haven’t been confirmed. You just sort of feel like, “Gosh, let’s get on with it.”
I’m enthusiastic about what this administration is doing on the energy landscape and the natural resource landscape. I think there’s finally an understanding that we can do both: We can produce energy and take care of the environment. I think that’s what Doug and I both had very similar agendas. And getting on with that is going to be really important, but then having that layer that can make that happen at the agency level is really key.
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CM: Can you talk a bit about nuclear energy opportunities in Wyoming?
MG: It is so exciting to see the nuclear market recover. This is an industry that in our country, we let it go for a couple of reasons—the [Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty] and all that sort of stuff. It’s important [the U.S.] can start to build back some of the fabrication, the enrichment, et cetera. But Wyoming, and again, New Mexico, have the two largest reserves of uranium.
With TerraPower coming online, this is new technology. And it’s nice because Wyoming’s not having to invest in it. It’s Bill Gates, and it’s Department of Energy. We’ve been to one groundbreaking, we’ve got another couple and then finally the reactor building coming along. And it is [scalable]. It takes components. We’re hoping to be able to build the job force being able to start to construct the components needed for that.
Ned Lamont, governor of Connecticut, is saying, “I can’t get natural gas from Oklahoma through New York—they don’t want it. So, I need something else.” John Sununu, before he dropped out of the governor’s office, was saying, “Everybody in New Hampshire is heating with fuel oil. It’s the worst, dirtiest thing we can do. We should be able to get nuclear.”
So, there’s a pent-up demand to do this. You’re hearing about all the old plants getting started up again. [TerraPower] is much more efficient. So much less waste. It passively shuts down, there’s no active component. Similar reactors have been running at [Idaho National Laboratory] since the 1950s, but this is a bit upgraded, better stuff.
Nuclear has an enormous future. We’ve also looked at BWXT, formerly Babcock & Wilcox. We were in Kuwait early on in our trade mission, and they are very interested in producing microreactors to run their oilfields on.
I think people are starting to look at what the economics are for these small modular reactors (SMRs). Microreactors may have an incredible role to play. So, we’ve tried to restructure our education system to be able to allow a couple of things:
One is to be able to make sure that we have the technicians and the others to make sure that the play goes on. Recognizing that those people probably have other ambitions, we also gave them the tools to move up the ladder to get more degrees, or whatever they need. They can do it through our universities and get into research, which is another area we’ve focused on with the [University of Wyoming] School of Energy Resources.
Our feeling is that we can provide our workforce with the people, and our people with the tools, to further their education and make their jobs more relevant as those jobs evolve.
CM: Can you talk about the extent and impact of last year’s wildfires in Wyoming?
MG: Wyoming has episodically had some bigger fires. Last year was our biggest year ever, and we burned some 800,000 acres, and it was pretty devastating in a couple of respects. Wyoming, as I’m sure we’ll cover, is almost 50% surface-owned federal lands. We had the first national park, we had the first national forest, we had some of the first wilderness areas, all of that kind of combined. So normally when we have big fires, they show up on federal lands, and that makes it a little less painful for us. It takes time to figure out the repayment scheme. Last year, mostly state and private lands—and big swaths.
I grew up in a town, and we still own a ranch west of Kaycee, which is just north of here a ways. The fire started just a little bit east and north of Kaycee. We have folks that are on the fire department. They responded to it, but that fire ran away from them at about 40 miles an hour. It actually burned just east of our place in Buffalo. So, it was an extensive fire. That was the House Draw Fire, which was the largest, but there were fires all over northeast Wyoming last year.
CM: What strategies are being used to manage wildfire risk, and how challenging is fire suppression under extreme conditions?
MG: Well, we’re looking at pre-positioning assets and doing some other things. It’s just that certain conditions just don’t allow you to fight fire particularly well. That’s sometimes hard for volunteers to understand. “I got my shovel, I got my backpack, I got my cap,” or whatever. But things can burn over fairly quickly.
That was a day that had excessively hot winds. And in those—well, you’ve seen it in Texas. When those conditions prevail, it is so hard. It becomes very much a process of trying to figure out the strategy of how you want to make your stand, where you want to make your stand, and things like that. And even then, you can have conditions change really remarkably.
A little bit southeast of here was the first large fire that we had. And it crawled up into some rocks and some really nasty stuff—juniper. It’s a very hard thing to put out, and it was starting to burn in the juniper. They kind of got a handle on it, and then it was kind of a matter of sort of mopping it up and gradually shrinking it and then doing the spot fires you had to put out. Then there was a storm cell that came through, and 70-mile-an-hour winds just blew it back over the top of everything they’d done to contain it—and it took off again.