Tag: wyoming

Deadly bacteria found in major US city’s wastewater system tied to Mark Zuckerberg’s $800m data center

Meta‘s massive AI data center in Wyoming is facing scrutiny after an unexpected contamination incident emerged during construction.

The Mark Zuckerberg-owned company is developing a 715,000sq ft campus in Cheyenne that is set to go online next year, but its contractor has come under fire after city officials traced wastewater containing a rare bacterium to the project.

Known as Cupriavidus gilardii, the naturally occurring bacterium is typically found in soil and water. While harmless to most healthy people, it can cause severe pneumonia, bloodstream and lung infections, and, in rare cases, death among people with weakened immune systems. 

Cheyenne’s Board of Public Utilities (BOPU) said the bacterium was found in wastewater discharged by Goat Systems, a contractor working on Meta’s $800 million data center. 

According to the BOPU, the bacterium was first detected during routine wastewater sampling in late February, but was only announced last Thursday.

Meta said its general contractor, Fortis, began hauling industrial wastewater offsite and that independent testing found no trace of the substance to date.

Officials stressed that it did not contaminate the city’s drinking water, but said it disrupted the municipal reclaimed water system and required months of cleanup. 

However, the city permanently revoked Meta’s authorization to discharge wastewater from its fill-and-flush operations into Cheyenne’s treatment system, where the water is recycled and later used to irrigate parks and other public spaces. 

A Meta spokesman told the Daily Mail: ‘When the board shared that it found a substance in the city’s wastewater – not public drinking water – Fortis immediately stopped discharging industrial wastewater and began hauling it offsite.

‘Fortis also began its own water testing with an independent environmental specialist, which has found no trace of the substance. 

‘Meta is committed to being a good neighbor in Cheyenne, including through the protection of local water resources, and will continue encouraging collaboration between Fortis and the board until this situation is resolved.’

It comes as AI data centers face mounting scrutiny across the US for their enormous demands on local water and power supplies. 

According to Data Center Map, there are nearly 4,500 data centers nationwide, with some facilities consuming as much as 300,000 gallons of water a day, roughly the same amount used by 1,000 households.

Goat Systems LLC is the corporate entity Meta uses for the construction of the center, dubbed Project Cosmo.

Officials said the contaminated wastewater was discharged during a fill-and-flush process used to prepare the data center’s cooling system before it goes online. 

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Wyoming: A thorough assessment of the threat wind turbines pose to eagles needs to be done

A programmatic Environmental Impact Assessment (“EIA”) is a comprehensive analysis of the cumulative impacts of the massive wind development underway in Wyoming. The growing adverse impact on golden eagles and other wildlife is especially disturbing. What can be done to limit the damage is a big part of the assessment.

There is National Environmental Policy Act (“NEPA”) language for this. It is called a “Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement (PEIS)” looking at “cumulative effects.” The Feds completed two back in 2024. The first one was for multiple offshore wind projects in the New York Bight. They then completed one for the five proposed floating wind projects off California. These are good precedents for Wyoming.

Of course, both these offshore wind studies were Biden-era greenwash jobs that mostly ignored the obvious adverse impact on protected whales and other marine mammals. This does not mean that a good PEIS cannot be done for Wyoming.

A good start on the PEIS issues can be found in the numerous comments already filed in opposition to individual Wyoming wind projects. For example, the Two Rivers Project received over a hundred pages of detailed technical comments, many regarding the extreme threat to golden eagles. Two Rivers is part of what is called the growing “wall of wind” in southeastern Wyoming.

The Two Rivers comments are HERE.

One of the best is “Comments on Environmental Assessment of the Two Rivers Wind Energy Project on behalf of National Audubon Society and the Wyoming Outdoor Council.” It is really a 17-page research report including lots of data and maps. See letter #16 of 18 [see below].

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Wyoming Introduces First-Ever Foreign Censorship Shield Bill

Wyoming has taken a historic step to insulate American speech from foreign interference with the introduction of the Wyoming Guaranteeing Rights Against Novel International Tyranny and Extortion (GRANITE) Act, House Bill 0070, which would be the first US law designed to create a private right of action against foreign censorship enforcement.

Representative Daniel Singh introduced the bill, declaring that “foreign governments have decided they can threaten American citizens and American companies for speech that is protected by our Constitution…Wyoming is drawing a line in the sand.” The measure aims to establish Wyoming as a refuge for free expression and digital innovation, directly challenging what lawmakers describe as an escalating campaign of transnational censorship pressure.

The legislation provides that any Wyoming resident, business, or US person with servers in the state may sue foreign governments or international organizations that attempt to enforce censorship demands against them for First Amendment protected speech. Each violation could cost the offending entity at least $1 million or 10% of its US revenue, whichever is higher.

The GRANITE Act prohibits Wyoming courts and agencies from recognizing or enforcing foreign censorship judgments. It also forbids any state cooperation with such orders, including extradition requests or data demands linked to speech that is constitutionally protected in the US. Under the bill, no Wyoming authority may help a foreign state investigate, penalize, or prosecute individuals over lawful expression.

We obtained a copy of the bill for you here.

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Wyoming conservation group sues federal agency to obtain data on eagles killed by wind farms

AWyoming conservation group filed a federal lawsuit this month against the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, arguing that the agency is illegally withholding records on bald and golden eagle deaths at three wind projects in southern Wyoming. 

Mike Lockhart, a biologist who worked for the Fish and Wildlife Service for over 30 years, told Just the News that the data the federal government is withholding could help assess the true impacts of wind energy in Wyoming on eagle mortality.

“We have no real idea of how many birds are being killed. There’s birds that I suspect are being killed that just disappear in the presence of the wind turbines. And I think the numbers are enormous compared to what we know right now,” Lockhart said. 

Blocked as “Privileged and confidential”

Earlier this year, the Albany County Conservancy, based in Laramie, Wyo., filed a request under the Freedom of Information Act, seeking records on the reported eagle deaths and injuries within two miles of Seven Mile Hill I/II, Ekola Flats, and Dunlap wind projects in southern Wyoming. 

The Interior Department responded by releasing 910 pages, while another 256 pages were redacted. The agency withheld the records under Exemption 4, which blocks the revelation of “trade secrets and commercial or financial information obtained from a person [that is] privileged or confidential.” 

The group filed an administrative appeal in May challenging the exemption and demanding the department release all the data it has related to the request. The ACC received no response to their appeal, and so they filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. 

File

ACC Complaint.pdf

Wind energy developers have been targeting the area of southeast Wyoming, which has some of the richest wind resources in the U.S. According to the ACC’s lawsuit, there will be 28 utility-scale wind farms operating across Wyoming by this summer, and some projects have over 500 turbines. 

“It’s not proprietary. It’s dead eagles,” conservationist says 

Anne Brande, executive director of the ACC, told Just the News that the ecological risks of so many projects make transparency in federal oversight all the more imperative. 

The law allows a certain number of eagles to be lost via a permitting system called the “eagle take.” Wind farm owners collect records on bird mortality as part of the eagle take permits the developers are required to have in order to disturb, injure and kill eagles.  This data is public information submitted to federal agencies as part of their permitting, Brande said, and there’s nothing in those records that could be legally withheld under Exemption 4. 

“It’s not proprietary. It’s dead eagles,” she said. 

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Wyoming Dealing With Eerie UFO Problem Being Described As ‘New Normal’

According to a local Wyoming sheriff’s office, unidentified flying objects (UFOs) continue to gather at high altitudes above the Red Desert and the Jim Bridger Power Plant in Sweetwater County.

Sheriff John Grossnickle of Sweetwater County personally observed the drone-resembling aerial objects, according to his spokesperson Jason Mower who informed the Cowboy State Daily of the information.

Mower noted that this represents 13 months of illuminated objects resembling drones assembling in groups, frequently appearing in organized patterns, above the Red Desert and the power plant. He further mentioned that their extreme altitude makes them impossible to target or bring down from ground level.

“We’ve worked with everybody,” said Mower to the Cowboy State Daily. “We’ve done everything we can to figure out what they are, and nobody wants to give us any answers.”

According to Mower, the sheriff accompanied Wyoming U.S. House Rep. Harriet Hageman to view the aerial objects, and she personally witnessed them.

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UFO Swarms Puzzle Wyoming County Officials

Mysterious swarms of UFOs have been appearing over a Wyoming county for over a year, leaving officials scratching their heads and searching for answers. According to a local media report, the curious clusters were first spotted in December of 2025 in the skies above the Jim Bridger Power Plant and the Red Desert in Sweetwater County. Although thought to be drones, the exact nature of illuminated aerial objects remains uncertain to authorities despite their best efforts to get to the bottom of the odd mystery.

“We’ve done everything we can to figure out what they are,” Jason Mower of the Sweetwater County Sheriff’s office explained, “and nobody wants to give us any answers.” Remarkably, he indicated that the once-astonishing UFOs have now become so commonplace that residents no longer even report seeing them to police. “It’s like the new normal,” Mower mused, noting that, despite being something of an unnerving presence in the sky, the objects have posed no danger to the public nor done anything to necessitate police action. Should that change, Mower stressed, “we’ll certainly act accordingly.”

It would appear that the situation in Sweetwater County is not an isolated phenomenon, as law enforcement officials in another part of the state also reported seeing similar recurring UFO swarms beginning in late 2024 and into the first quarter of 2025 until they suddenly stopped visiting. The subject even came up during a state legislature meeting wherein Wyoming National Guard leader Greg Porter was reportedly asked about “any incidents of UAPs over your airspace,” to which he replied “no.” That said, he interestingly added that he knew of cases “near some other federal facilities,” but that he could not publicly discuss them.

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The GRANITE ACT: Wyoming Bill Targets Foreign Censors With $10M Penalties

The first cannon shot in a new kind of free speech war came not from Washington or Silicon Valley, but from Cheyenne. Wyoming Representative Daniel Singh last week filed the Wyoming GRANITE Act.

The “Guaranteeing Rights Against Novel International Tyranny & Extortion Act,” passed, would make Wyoming the first state to let American citizens sue foreign governments that try to police what they say online.

The bill traces back to a blog post by attorney Preston Byrne, the same lawyer representing 4chan and Kiwi Farms in their battles against censorship-driven British regulators.

Byrne’s idea was simple: if the UK’s Ofcom or Brazil’s Alexandre de Moraes wanted to fine or threaten Americans over online speech, the US should hit back hard.

Exactly one month after that idea appeared on his blog, it’s now inked into Wyoming legislative paperwork.

Byrne said:

“This bill has a long way to go until it becomes a law, it’s got to make it through legislative services, then to Committee, and then get introduced on the floor for a vote, but the important thing is, the journey of this concept, the idea of a foreign censorship shield law which also creates a civil cause of action against foreign censors, into law has begun.”

That “journey” may be the kind of slow procedural trudge that usually kills most ideas in committee, but the intent here is anything but mild, and, with the growing threat of censorship demands from the UK, Brazil, Europe, and Australia, there is a lot of momentum here to fight back.

“For the first time, state legislators are moving to implement rules that will allow U.S. citizens to strike back, hard, against foreign countries that want to interfere with Americans’ civil rights online,” Byrne continued.

The Act would let American citizens and companies sue foreign governments or their agents for trying to censor them, and, crucially, it strips away the usual escape hatch of sovereign immunity.

In its legal filing responding to the 4chan and KiwiFarms lawsuit, Ofcom insisted it has “sovereign immunity” and told the court there were “substantial grounds” for throwing out the case on that basis.

The regulator’s lawyers framed Ofcom as a protected arm of the British state, immune from civil claims even when its decisions target a platform based entirely inside the United States.

Ofcom treats the idea of “sovereign immunity” as something substantial but the First Amendment as something that does not exist at all.

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Wyoming Parent Wins Free Speech Lawsuits Against Sweetwater County School Officials

It’s one thing to bake cupcakes for the school fundraiser. It’s another to find yourself explaining your Facebook posts to a judge. Yet that’s precisely where Kari Cochran, a Wyoming mother with a stubborn streak and a social media account, ended up. Twice.

For the uninitiated, Kari isn’t your run-of-the-mill parent who just grumbles in the car line. She once sat on the Sweetwater County School Board, where she learned that speaking your mind can make you the most talked-about person in the faculty lounge.

Her habit of asking uncomfortable questions about district leadership might have made her unpopular, but it also made her the kind of parent who doesn’t disappear quietly when things get messy.

Cochran’s online posts, sharp enough to make a superintendent wince, were her way of keeping the school district accountable. “Publicly accused [the] petitioner of unprofessional and unethical conduct,” one court filing complained.

In other words, she said things out loud that people in small towns usually only whisper over coffee at the diner.

Her criticism didn’t sit well with everyone. Two people connected to the district, Assistant Superintendent Nicole Bolton and Laura Libby Vinger, the wife of Superintendent Josh Libby, decided the comments had crossed into stalking. They filed civil petitions to try to stop her from speaking.

It didn’t work. Both cases were tossed out this year. Circuit Court Judge Michael Greer dismissed Bolton’s petition in August, reminding everyone that public officials are “subjected to public scrutiny.” (If you’re paid by taxpayers, you don’t get to hide from them.) A magistrate later dismissed Vinger’s case, too.

Cochran was, understandably, relieved. “Parents, students, or staff members should never feel that they should be silenced or punished for standing up for what’s right,” she said to The Center Square.

Her lawyer, Parker Jackson of the Goldwater Institute, had a less sentimental view.

If Cochran had lost, he explained, she might have been banned from attending district events or even school board meetings. “It essentially would’ve turned these school officials into roaming censors where, wherever they didn’t want Kari to be, they could show up and force her to leave,” Jackson said.

Cochran’s battle didn’t begin with Facebook posts. It began with heartbreak. Her son Joran, a graduate of Rock Springs High School, died by suicide in 2023 after being bullied.

It’s the kind of loss that rearranges your life completely. She resigned from the school board afterward, but she didn’t stop pushing for better mental health support and accountability in the district.

When she asked to see her son’s school records, the district refused. Then, as if to make her point for her, the board introduced a rule restricting what topics citizens could address during public comment. So Cochran did what most parents do when the microphone is taken away: she turned to Facebook.

Her posts gained traction. They also drew ire. The day a sheriff showed up with not one but two stalking petitions, Cochran said she felt “complete fear,” unsure what she’d done wrong.

“Complete fear” seems like an understatement for having your free speech hauled into court by the very people you’re criticizing.

The rulings didn’t erase the months of stress. Cochran said the ordeal drained her and took away time she wanted to spend with her daughter before high school began.

But her victory sends a message: criticizing your school district may make you unpopular, but it isn’t a crime.

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AI in Wyoming may soon use more electricity than state’s human residents

On Monday, Mayor Patrick Collins of Cheyenne, Wyoming, announced plans for an AI data center that would consume more electricity than all homes in the state combined, according to The Associated Press. The facility, a joint venture between energy infrastructure company Tallgrass and AI data center developer Crusoe, would start at 1.8 gigawatts and scale up to 10 gigawatts of power use.

The project’s energy demands are difficult to overstate for Wyoming, the least populous US state. The initial 1.8-gigawatt phase, consuming 15.8 terawatt-hours (TWh) annually, is more than five times the electricity used by every household in the state combined. That figure represents 91 percent of the 17.3 TWh currently consumed by all of Wyoming’s residential, commercial, and industrial sectors combined. At its full 10-gigawatt capacity, the proposed data center would consume 87.6 TWh of electricity annually—double the 43.2 TWh the entire state currently generates.

Because drawing this much power from the public grid is untenable, the project will rely on its own dedicated gas generation and renewable energy sources, according to Collins and company officials. However, this massive local demand for electricity—even if self-generated—represents a fundamental shift for a state that currently sends nearly 60 percent of its generated power to other states.

Wyoming Governor Mark Gordon praised the project’s potential benefits for the state’s natural gas industry in a company statement. “This is exciting news for Wyoming and for Wyoming natural gas producers,” Gordon said.

The proposed site for the new data center sits several miles south of Cheyenne near the Colorado border off US Route 85. While state and local regulators still need to approve the project, Collins expressed optimism about a quick start. “I believe their plans are to go sooner rather than later,” he said.

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VICTORY FOR VOTER INTEGRITY: Federal Judge Tosses Leftist Lawsuit — Delivers Knockout Win in Wyoming’s on Proof of Citizenship Requirement

In a crushing blow to radical left-wing lawyer Marc Elias and his progressive allies, a federal judge has tossed out a lawsuit that sought to gut Wyoming’s new election integrity law.

United States District Court Judge Scott Skavdahl ruled in favor of Secretary of State Chuck Gray and dismissed outright the lawsuit filed by the Equality State Policy Center, which had enlisted notorious Democrat operative Marc Elias in a blatant attempt to strike down House Bill 156—Wyoming’s common-sense requirement that all voter registrants provide proof of U.S. citizenship and state residency.

In his 17-page ruling, Judge Skavdahl SLAMMED the plaintiffs for lacking any standing whatsoever, exposing the entire case as a baseless political attack dressed up as a legal complaint.

“Plaintiff has not adequately demonstrated its standing to sue on its own behalf or on behalf of others in this action,” Skavdahl wrote. “The Court lacks subject matter jurisdiction over this lawsuit, and consequently it must be dismissed.”

The court wrote:

To establish Article III standing to sue, the law requires the plaintiff to show three requirements:
(1) it has suffered an “injury in fact” that is (a) concrete and particularized and (b) actual or imminent, not conjectural or hypothetical; (2) the injury is fairly traceable to the challenged action of the defendant; and (3) it is likely, as opposed to merely speculative, that the injury will be redressed by a favorable decision.

Assuming Plaintiffs assertions to be true, they do not establish its standing to bring this lawsuit in its own capacity. Plaintiff has not shown a concrete injury in fact that is fairly traceable to HB 156.

Plaintiffs alleged diversion-of-resources injury is the same type of injury claimed in AllianceforHippocraticMedicine,but the U.S. Supreme Court determined this type of alleged injury was not a concrete injury in fact traceable to the challenged governmental conduct sufficient to satisfy Article III standing.

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