One More For The Road

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<title>One More For The Road: Saturday, September 7, 2024 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

One More For The Road: Saturday, September 7, 2024

 "Yeah, Bob's on roller skates but he should be able to pick up our coffees....."

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily's business and tourism reporter, Renée Jean

Renée Jean

Government & Politics

Executive

EVANSTON — Uinta County’s Planning and Zoning Commission chamber was packed from wall to wall Wednesday night with residents spilling into the hallway as Prometheus Hyperscale’s massive data center on the Thornock family ranch came up for a key vote.

But when it was time for the public to step up to the microphone, only a handful of people did.

After weeks of questions and skepticism at public forums and on social media, most of the standing-room-only crowd listened quietly as commissioners voted unanimously to recommend zoning and conditional use permit approvals to Uinta County commissioners for the proposed 1.25 gigawatt, 500-acre, off-grid campus.

The quiet was a stark contrast to the tone of an earlier meeting the night before, where hundreds turned out to ask questions, and at times became emotional.

Uinta County resident Keaunna Archuleta, one of those who did step up to speak Wednesday, told Cowboy State Daily she’d filled “five notebooks” with questions about the project that wants to become Evanston’s neighbor.

“In regards to the coolant system, in the event of an emergency, like a leakage, what kind of response plan do we have for that?” she asked in the packed meeting room. 

“As far as what that could look like, you know, severe weather, fires, things like that. I think that’s an important thing to know about,” she said.

Archuleta also wanted to know how much water would be needed to charge the closed-loop cooling system Prometheus founder Trenton Thornock had mentioned during his presentation at the beginning of the meeting. 

“What happens to the coolant?” she asked. “Where does it go? How does that affect the environment?”

And what about the facility’s diesel generators, she wondered. 

“Those are generally the size of a rail-car,” she said. “How many of those are going to be used, and what type of emissions are going to be contaminating our air? I think these are things that affect everyone and need to be considered. Those are my questions, thank you.”

Roddy Martin, meanwhile, who lives in Lyman, wanted to know how much natural gas the turbines would use to produce 1.25 gigawatts of power and Barbara Lowe wanted to know just how many decibels and what frequencies the data center would cause. 

“You mentioned the decibels were low,” she said. “My question is about the frequencies and how it affects our animals and wildlife and people’s livestock.”

Thornock had earlier said the sound levels would be between 60 to 70 decibels at the fence line — about the same as a dishwasher running in the kitchen. 

Another 1,000 feet away, the decibels drop to between 45 and 55, which Thornock said is quieter than a normal conversation, and quieter than his current speaking tone.

Holly Pfeiffer, who lives up in Robertson, wanted to know what makes Prometheus Hyperscale different than all the other data centers being protested around the country. 

“People are having problems with contamination of their water, their soil, their air,” she said. “Others have no water, they ran out of water. 

"How is that any different from what they’re doing, what you guys are doing here? If I could get that answered, that would be fantastic.”

The questions came out rapid fire, in intermittent batches toward the end of each hearing. What stood out just as much was how many people never spoke at all. Most had come simply to listen.

Prometheus Will Be Cleaner, Quieter, Off-Grid

Thornock took notes on each question, and answered them in small batches.

“So regarding the frequencies, there have been a number of studies done,” he said. “Most low frequency comes from natural sources like thunder, waves, earthquakes, and some unnatural sources like concealed nuclear tests. We will study all of the frequencies that are available to us when we do our acoustic study.”

That study will include a baseline before the data center is built. 

“We’ll be happy to share ongoing measurements once we start the facility,” he said.

As far as the coolant response plan, the data center will have catchment basins that are part of its engineering plan from the get-go, he said.

“In the unlikely event there is a spill, it will go into a containment area,” Thornock said. “How much water does it initially use? Well, it’s 75% water and 25% propylene glycol. 

"It will take approximately three Olympic swimming pools worth of fluid to do the initial fill, which lasts six years for each building.”

Even though propylene glycol is nontoxic, coolant will not be discharged, Thornock added. 

“The same supplier who supplies the coolant will be responsible to remove the coolant and dispose of it properly under EPA rules,” he said. “Diesel backup generators are fully scrubbed with the latest scrubbing technology. 

"The emissions are subject to the EPA and the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality, so we will be applying for the appropriate air permits when it’s time.”

The data center Thornock has proposed to build on his family’s ranch land is different, he said, because he has seen the problems the woman mentioned and decided to try and solve them.

“The problem that I saw with the industry when I started is that the industry did not care how much power it consumed,” he said. “It did not care how much water was consumed for the compute. The whole point of starting this company was to provide a new type of infrastructure that was more environmentally responsible.”

The closed-loop system Thornock plans to use alone makes his data center different from 98% of them out there, he said. 

“If you go to Dulles, Washington, on the Washington River, the Umatilla tribe fought for years, filed lawsuits to find out how much water Google was using on a daily basis, because everyone had signed NDAs, including the city officials,” Thornock said. 

“Eventually, that had to be disclosed,” he added. "The Umatilla tribe got their wish, and I supported them in their efforts. So that’s how we’re different.”

Before public questions and comments, Thornock tackled the “sell-out” accusation he’d heard the night before at a three-hour public forum Prometheus Hyperscale hosted at Evanston’s Roundhouse, which drew hundreds.

“I want you all to know this,” Thornock said. “This for me is home still. This land in the community matters to me in a way that goes well beyond business.”

As far as leaving the state goes, the story behind that is short and telling. It’s the same story for a lot of his classmates too, who left Wyoming to find high enough paying jobs to support a family. 

“The day after I graduated from high school, I went to work for a company in Afton called Trio Electric as a welder,” he said. “Trio, at that time, could not find any work in Wyoming, so I moved to Colorado. That’s the end of my story.”

Thornock said he’d rather earn everyone’s trust with facts than ask for approval without facts.

“I didn’t start Prometheus and then come here looking for land,” he said. “I started it after looking at the land with my brother. We have known for a long time, and we saw an opportunity to bring generational wealth to a community that we’re already a part of.”

Thornock first put up slides showing exactly where his project will be. 

“As things have evolved, the section of land that we’re proposing to build a data center campus on has shifted, and we are now in Township 15 North Range 118 West, Section 13,” he said. “It’s right off exit 13 on Interstate 80. Most people blow by that, unless they’re working on the wind farms on the north side of the freeway. We are on the south side.”

The data center would be 500 acres, a size Thornock said would allow the company to maintain a buffer around the data center to help minimize its visibility to neighbors.

“The closest land use to us is the Evanston Silver Eagle refinery, which you can see is the postage stamp to the left of the little BLM section,” he said. “The rest of the land is vacant.”

The initial campus will support more than 1.25 gigawatts of computing capacity, which Thornock said would be developed over five phases. 

“The build footprint, which is the actual buildings, is expected to cover roughly eight to nine football fields worth of space,” he said. “And for perspective, your county planner and GIS specialist asked me to arrange a tour for them of an operating data center that’s more or less like this one. 

"It exists in West Jordan, Utah, and in that case it’s directly across from a single-family subdivision.”

Water use, once the facility is completed, will be around 15 homes’ worth.

“That’s the entire campus, not per building,” he said. “And again, your county planning folks have seen a facility very similar to this one in size, and it uses that amount of water. They can say that because they’re up and running.”

Water will not be drawn from Uinta County’s water supply, Thornock added, nor will waste water be discharged to any local systems. 

“The cooling system is closed loop, which means it circulates internally,” he said. “The only wells on site serve the office buildings and bathrooms for basic domestic use. We understand that water supply is foundational to this county. Our design was built around that reality. 

"From Day One, zero demand on the county and zero discharge. It’s not a footnote, it’s a core design requirement that we gave to our tenant.”

Power, meanwhile, will be generated on site and off-grid. 

“It does not draw from the public grid, because it’s not even connected,” he said. “That means your power bills cannot be affected. The reliability of electricity for homes and businesses in Evanston is not affected. We’re not competing with you for grid capacity. We’re building our own.”

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Job Promises "}]

Thornock is taking extra care when it comes to hiring locally, he said. 

“I know this is not a technical requirement of the subdivision process or the conditional use permit,” Thornock said. “This is presented to you just for color.”

Thornock has instructed his contractors that any person with a Wyoming license wins when it comes to a “tossup” during the hiring process. 

“This project will create 3,800 temporary construction jobs,” he said. “These folks are not all going to show up at once. There’s going to be a long ramp. It’s going to take a while for us to spool up.”

Once the earthwork is done and the project goes vertical, there will be hundreds of positions for electricians, iron workers, pipe fitters, fiber technicians, HVAC crews, and surveyors.

Once operational, the campus will have 200 long-term jobs for facility technicians, network and data center operations staff, mechanical and electrical maintenance, security and site management.

“These are skilled, well-paying positions,” Thornock said. “And then there’s the multiplier. For every direct job this project creates there will be an estimated six additional jobs supported in the broader economy.”

That’s data based on a PricewaterhouseCoopers study, Thornock said. 

Construction could start within the next six months, pending receipt of required permits, and the full buildout of the 1.25 gigawatts of power will be delivered in phases over a period of roughly 48 to 60 months. 

That will be four to five years of activity.

“That phased approach means that Uinta County will see sustained construction activity for several years,” Thornock said. “And it also means you will have ample opportunity to observe how we operate, hold us accountable, and see our commitments in action before we get to scale.”

Thornock not only committed to showing water usage on a public portal, he asked planning commissioners to add the stipulation to his conditional use permit. 

He also committed to repairing or replacing a bridge on County Road 1818 and performing a complete analysis of heat from the data center and how it is dispersed and asked that these be added as conditions of the permit.

“We’ve committed to hiring locally, supporting the community, and remaining accessible throughout this entire process,” Thornock said. “And when the time is right, I will insist that our tenant come here and work on our community benefits agreement, which is a contract that we intend to make among ourselves and the community. 

"We do want to answer every question you have tonight, and we want you to have a direct line to us going forward.”

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Some Uncertainties Remain"}]

After the meeting, Archuleta said she is still making up her mind about the data center project.

“It seems like they’re going as clean as they possibly can when it comes to a lot of the emissions, when it comes to the environmental stuff,” she said. “But some of it was kind of vague, like the natural gas and things like that. That wasn’t hit on as much as I would have liked.”

There was also talk about jobs that she felt was also somewhat vague.

“We don’t know what type of training, what type of apprenticeships, age limits there will be,” she said. “Is this something that the younger people going into the workforce can get into, or is this only for people who have certifications? It is going to supply jobs, but jobs to who? And how is it going to be accessible for those who don’t have the training.”

There will be economic benefits, she acknowledged. But she wants to see details like that discussed. 

“There’s a lot to know,” she said. “And I think (county) officials need to do their research on data centers before they come to a council like this. 

"I think they should do their research if they’re going to approve or not approve something like this.”

Prometheus Uinta planners 20260527 201451 5 28 26

<title>Uinta County Planners Give Unanimous OK To 1.25-Gigawatt Prometheus Data Center | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Uinta County planners voted unanimously Wednesday to recommend permit approvals for a huge 1.25-gigawatt data center. “Officials need to do their research on data centers,” said one of the few people from the standing-room-only crowd to speak out.

Uinta County Planners Give Unanimous OK To 1.25-Gigawatt Prometheus Data Center

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily's general assignment reporter, Clair McFarland.

Clair McFarland

Crime & Courts

Courts

punishable by up to five years in prison and $10,000, the former Weston County Clerk who admitted to causing errors in the 2024 general election was sentenced Wednesday to pay a $500 fine and $220 in other court costs and fees.

Circuit Court Judge Lynda Bush found that “no term of incarceration or period of probation shall be imposed” on Becky Hadlock.

Hadlock had a plea agreement in place in which she agreed to plead guilty — and gave that plea Wednesday — to a misdemeanor charge of election law violation. 

The plea agreement said that in exchange, she’d pay the $720 in fines, costs and fees.

Bush didn’t have to accept that plea agreement, but if the judge had rejected it, Hadlock would have been able to withdraw her guilty plea and renegotiate her case, the agreement says.

Hadlock, her attorney Ryan Semerad, and special prosecutor Dan Itzen filed the agreement Tuesday.

 with two different felonies: violation of the election code by an election official, and falsifying election documents.

Had she been convicted for both and sentenced to the maximum, she could have faced up to 10 years in prison and up to $20,000 in fines.

One day after her April 8 charging and a roughly two-hour stay in the local jail, Hadlock announced her resignation as Weston County Clerk.

Itzen told Cowboy State Daily on Thursday that Hadlock quitting wasn’t part of the plea agreement.

It did, however, factor into the prosecutors’ thinking when they knocked the two felonies down to one misdemeanor and agreed not to push for jail time, he said.

“After she removed herself from office we reduced that to a misdemeanor and kind of went from there,” said Itzen. “That wasn’t part of the agreement. 

"But as I looked at the case, that was one of the main goals of our office as well as law enforcement — removal from office and making sure those things don’t happen again.”

Meanwhile, Hadlock has also reached a settlement in a Casper Circuit Court case where she’s accused of defying a legislative subpoena, court documents indicate. 

Lawmakers last September subpoenaed Hadlock to question her about her handling of the 2024 election. 

Before Hadlock was subpoenaed, she had made it clear to legislative staffers that she could not attend the meeting as she’d scheduled doctors’ appointments for the day it was set to happen in Casper, court documents show.

Defying a legislative subpoena carries a penalty of up to six months in jail and $100 in fines.

It’s unclear what Hadlock’s plea agreement or settlement terms are in that case. They were not in the public-facing court file as of Thursday.

Itzen declined to comment on that case Thursday, noting that it’s still ongoing.

Hadlock, who pleaded not guilty in October, is set to change her plea in the subpoena case on June 24 in Casper Circuit Court.

[{"type":"text","text":"Hadlock’s attorney declined Thursday to comment."}]

[{"type":"text","text":"These 19 Months"}]

Stretching across about 19 months, numerous news stories, one legislative investigation, a misdemeanor case, a civil removal case and then the felony arrest, Hadlock’s case is a familiar one in Wyoming political circles. 

Before she resigned, the Wyoming Attorney General’s Office was pursuing a civil 

 alleging that Hadlock had committed misconduct or malfeasance in office, and that the court should remove her from office. That case became moot when Hadlock resigned.

Semerad in an earlier motion to dismiss the civil case called the saga “tortured and petty.”

He challenged whether Hadlock’s failure to appear for the legislative subpoena could comprise misconduct or malfeasance “in office” under Wyoming’s removal-from-office mechanism. 

Hadlock has made headlines since November 2024, when she reportedly allowed faulty ballots to mingle with proper ballots in the general election, skewing two uncontested races and raising questions about whether her post-election audit was done in good faith.

“Prior to submitting her post-election audit,” says the attorney general’s petition to remove her, “Hadlock was informed that the anomalous undervote reported in the House District One race was likely due to ballot errors.”

Still, the petition adds, she submitted a post-election audit to the Wyoming Secretary of State’s Office showing no errors affecting any of the 75 sample ballots audited.

That same day someone emailed her to confirm that faulty ballots mixed into the race had produced inaccurate results.

“Hadlock acknowledged the error but did not withdraw or correct her audit at that time,” says the petition. 

She later agreed to a hand count, and the election results were correct by three days after the election, Nov. 8, 2024.

[{"type":"text","text":"Complaints Filed"}]

The petition says that by Nov. 9, however, Hadlock “still had not withdrawn or corrected” the audit.

She addressed those issues Nov. 12, by submitting a corrected audit — this time showing 21 errors affecting the 75 ballots, all owing to the faulty ballots that had been mixed into the election, the document adds.

Some Weston County residents filed complaints asking Gov. Mark Gordon to remove Hadlock from office.

She’d done a poor job but didn’t show the misconduct or malfeasance to vault the state to that level, Gordon countered. 

Gordon did not consider the questionable post-election audit Hadlock had filed because the people qualified to bring the governor’s investigation complaints didn’t raise that point, his office later told lawmakers.  

Secretary of State Chuck Gray, a vocal, frequent critic of Hadlock, had raised that complaint, but he wasn’t a qualified elector of Weston County, so he couldn’t ask for the governor’s investigation under the relevant law.

So Weston County residents filed another batch of complaints, this time including the post-election audit concern.

 that the broader body of evidence was sufficient to recommend Hadlock for removal and turned the question over to Attorney General Keith Kautz. He pointed to her failure to show for the legislative subpoena.

Kautz, along with four attorneys working in his office, filed a petition in February in Weston County District Court calling for Hadlock to be removed from her post.

Hadlock and new Weston County Courthouse courthouses co 4 9 26

<title>Former Weston County Clerk Gets $720 Fine, No Jail As Prosecutor Ditches Felonies | Cowboy State Daily</title>

The former Weston County Clerk who admitted to causing errors in the 2024 election was sentenced Wednesday after pleading guilty to a lesser charge in a deal that includes no jail time. That she resigned was “one of the main goals,” said the prosecutor.

Former Weston County Clerk Gets $720 Fine, No Jail As Prosecutor Ditches Felonies

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily's Feature Reporter, Andrew Rossi.

Andrew Rossi

Business & Tourism

Tourism

The Maverik gas station in Montrose, Colorado, can’t sell any diesel after someone dumped an RV’s waste tank into the station’s underground diesel supply.

The incident happened sometime on Monday, and a woman who answered the phone at the Montrose Maverik station on Tuesday confirmed that someone had dumped an RV waste tank into its underground diesel storage tank.

She said the pumps “are shut down right now,” that the store was busy, and hung up.

Cowboy State Daily hasn’t been able to confirm the status of the situation at the Montrose Maverik since that call. Subsequent calls weren’t answered.

Evan Peters shared details of the incident in the Facebook group Montrose Message Board.

“They dumped into the large manhole covers near the road directly into the diesel tank,” he wrote. “They have a dedicated dump at the larger pumps, but I guess someone decided to undo the manhole and dump there.”

To add insult to injury, Peters said a cashier at the Montrose Maverik told him the station had “just gotten a new delivery of diesel.”

Now, they’ll have to pump everything out of the tank and thoroughly clean it before it’s operational.

That’s what happens when someone’s No. 2 becomes someone else’s No. 1 problem.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"A Necessary Evil"}]

Bill Sniffin, an avid RV enthusiast and Cowboy State Daily columnist, said emptying an RV’s waste tank is “a necessary evil of RVing.”

“Let me tell you, it’s not fun,” he said. “It's usually a two-person operation, and it’s pretty darn rank.”

When Sniffin heard about the incident at the Montrose Maverik, he said it was “almost unbelievable.” 

He couldn’t see how anyone could confuse an RV dump station for the portal leading to a diesel fuel tank, regardless of how the gas station is situated.

“The dump stations are very obvious,” he said. “They’ll have signs all over the place, and it’s very self-explanatory.”

When people rent or buy RVs, they might not anticipate that anything that’s flushed down the on-board toilet needs to be emptied, usually every week or so. It’s the least glamorous part of traveling via RV.

“You can’t hire anybody to do it for you,” Sniffin said. “Luckily, I've got a wife who's a pretty good sport about it, but I have to admit that I have many pictures of her standing over the tank, holding her nose, and trying not to yuck.”

When discussing the Montrose incident, Sniffin kept referencing the 2006 film “RV” starring the late Robin Williams. In the movie, Williams plays an oblivious dad who rents an RV for a fun family vacation.

There’s a particular scene where Williams’s character has to empty the RV’s waste tank. Williams used his comedic genius to make the most of the all-too-relatable moment.

“He doesn’t know how to do it, so of course it explodes into a brown Old Faithful,” Sniffin said. “Anybody who's ever been in the RV business looks at that scene, cringes, and says, ‘For the grace of God, go sweet, those hoses better not pop loose.”

Sniffin has never had an incident as severe as depicted in “RV.” His worst experience was when one of the hoses he used to empty the waste tank split in the hot sun.

[{"type":"text","text":"“It was a helluva mess,” he said."}]

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Black Then Gray (In That Order)"}]

RVs have two notable tanks that need to be emptied regularly. The gray water tank holds the water used for sinks and showers, and the black water tank holds the smelly stuff.

According to Sniffin, an experienced RVer knows they need to empty the black tank before the gray tank.

“You have two valves and one hose,” he said. “The routine is to do the black valve first, so all the really bad stuff is gone, then you do the gray valve to rinse out all the stuff as it goes down.”

Where can you empty the black tank? It can be more logistically challenging than many people, especially first-time RVers, realize.

Most RV campsites have waste tank dump sites, either a singular designated spot or one at each hookup, if it’s a full-service site. RVers on the road can empty their black water tanks at fairgrounds, truck stops, and water treatment plants, usually for a fee.

Some gas stations, including Maverik, have dump stations available for free. 

They’re usually clearly marked, with lots of signage telling RVers of all stripes exactly where to back up and bail out their black water tanks.

That comes with a certain risk, as the Montrose Maverik discovered this week.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Everyone Has Stories"}]

Andrea Wood, general manager at the Devils Tower/Black Hills KOA campground, has an RV waste tank dump station at her campground. However, it’s only available to “registered campers.”

“They can reserve a water and electric site, which means they use our dump station, or they are in a full hookup site, which means they hook directly to the sewer system.”

Anyone else who asks to swing in and use their dump station is directed to the Crook County Fairgrounds in Sundance. It’s best not to take chances.

“Anyone who works at a campground will have fecal matter stories for you,” she said. “It is not a daily occurrence, but it happens with frequency, without question.”

Wood couldn’t recall a particularly “exciting” incident at the Devils Tower/Black Hills KOA campground, although there’s nothing exciting about it.

According to her, the most common problem is people “emptying their black water tanks into whatever hole they can find.”

“Not only is it inconvenient and gross, but it's a biohazard,” she said. “The cleanup is never much fun, but it's also a safety concern.”

That said, there’s a particular demographic that’s the most problematic. Nearly every incident Wood could recall involved inexperienced RVers who were “unaware” of what they were doing.

“Lots of people buy or rent campers thinking it's going to be a fun vacation thing, but they don't truly grasp the maintenance and what's required to take a rig down the road,” she said.

Sometimes, people dump their black water tanks in the first spot they find. Sometimes, they don’t even wait for a promising pipe.

“Some people don't bother to put their black water tubing into the sewer hole, and have dumped it straight onto the ground,” Wood said. “Other times, they found something alongside the road that looked like it might work for them and pumped their things into that. 

"It's always amazing to us where they choose to dump, because it's really, it's quite simple.”

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"'Unbelievably Newbie'"}]

Sniffin’s guess was that whoever was responsible for the incident was “unbelievably newbie.” They would have had to unscrew the lid to the subterranean fuel tank, insert their hose into it, and let ‘er rip.

“It’s almost unbelievable,” he said. “The whole process is so unpleasant that it's bad enough, but then doing it in the wrong place is just unbelievable to me.”

Wood shared the assessment that the perpetrator was probably a first-time or inexperienced RVer. However, she added that many RV mishaps are caused by foreign tourists who have even less experience with RVs than the average American.

“We get lots of German and French travelers that travel with Cruise America, and they are frequently very unfamiliar with the RVs,” she said. “It's just about knowing and understanding the rig that they're driving and being able to use it the way it's meant to be used, which many don’t.”

Regardless of their experience or ethnicity, the person who made the mistake in Montrose just made their vacation a lot more expensive.

Sniffin, who used to work at a gas station, knows how laborious and meticulous it is to maintain fuel tanks. Correcting the mistake at the Montrose Maverik will be costly and time-consuming.

A Colorado Maverik station can’t sell any diesel after someone dumped an RV’s waste tank into the station’s underground diesel supply tank this week. One avid RVer said the mistake is “almost unbelievable … the dump stations are very obvious."

One More For The Road: Saturday, September 7, 2024

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