Though bargaining continues, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act could land on President Donald Trump’s desk later this week with major implications for Wyoming’s energy economy and, very likely, residents’ electric bills.
For better or worse? Depends on whether you believe renewable energy is a help or a hindrance to meet the exploding electrical demand.
Wyoming’s top politicians suggest the bill, in its Senate form, is a panacea for affordable fossil-fuel and nuclear energy. It will “unleash affordable, available, reliable Wyoming energy,” Wyoming Republican Sen. John Barrasso said this week.
Critics, meantime, warn that renewable energy is left out of the bill’s unleashing. Instead, the sweeping budget and policy bill will deliver a punishing blow to wind and solar projects by stripping key federal tax credits and solidifying Trump administration efforts to suppress permitting and other support for the industries, likely jeopardizing hundreds of projects slated throughout the country, they say.
Estimates of what that means for U.S. ratepayers’ monthly electric bills over the next several years range from a 10% to 20% increase.
One consumer advocacy group — Clean Energy Buyers Association, whose 400 members include Microsoft, Amazon and Google — warned that if the renewable energy sector loses the 45Y and 48E production and investment tax credits, it would raise the cost of electricity in Wyoming by an average 29% — the steepest increase in the nation.
“There is no question that removing tech-neutral energy credits would cause economic harm and job losses and drive up electricity prices in more than half the country,” the association’s CEO, Rich Powell, said in a prepared statement last month.
Reached Tuesday by WyoFile, the association said it could not provide further details regarding its Big Beautiful Bill analysis for Wyoming. You can read highlights and find links to its full report here. For now, many local utility officials are reserving comments as they review the 900-plus-page bill.
The average Wyoming household pays about $105 per month for electricity compared to the U.S. average of about $135, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
Renewables’ growing role in Wyoming
For all of Wyoming’s fossil fuel might, tilting federal policy toward coal, oil and natural gas and away from renewables doesn’t cleanly translate into more affordable electricity, according to industry watchers. The U.S. fleet of coal-fired power plants, for example, is old and increasingly expensive to operate, utilities say.
Meantime, wind and solar — albeit with the help of federal tax incentives — continually improve their cost efficiency while helping meet an insatiable demand to power artificial intelligence and other computational industries. Wind and solar are the fastest-growing sources of new electrical power in the nation, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Wind power in Wyoming has doubled since 2019, making up more than 21% of electrical generation in the state.
If that momentum goes away, it will be difficult for utilities to maintain rates and meet burgeoning new demand, said Jonathan Naughton, director of the University of Wyoming’s Wind Energy Research Center.
“If you take a look at what could be built and installed today, it’s wind, solar and [energy] storage,” Naughton told WyoFile.
Adding more nuclear power generation takes a long time, Naughton added, and no utility is proposing to build a new coal plant. Thanks to AI and industrial competition for direct power additions, “if you try and buy a [natural] gas turbine right now, you’re looking at five to six years before you can get one.”
Naughton declined to speculate on the Big Beautiful Bill’s potential implications for Wyoming’s electric ratepayers. However, increasing competition for new power, he said, has developers scrambling to build whatever form of power generation that can be installed the fastest.
“It comes down to, ‘How can government and the administration affect these things?'” Naughton said. “The bottom line is, we need a lot of electricity generation developed over the next 10 years. And what is ready? I think wind and solar and [energy] storage are really ready to do that.”
The governor is right in the all above approach on our energy. I hear windmills kill eagles. The number one cause of death on eagles is lead poisoning from animal carcasses, collide with vehicles while feeding on carcasses, electrocution, while perching on high voltage, power poles, and illegal shooting remains a significant cause of death of eagles.
What is not talked about in this rate increase cycle we seeing is the electric consumption of these data centers and the bit coin mining that goes on.
As always, energy production continues to ignore the low hanging fruit that is dangling right brfore their faces: property owners! Why can’t I have a subsidy to help me purchase the equipment necessary to add solar AND wind generation on my property? By helping property owners take themselves off the grid, it will free up copious amounts of energy for industrial use! I don’t have numbers available to back up my assertion, but I would guess this could alleviate the need for more than a few gas fired or nuclear powered generators.
Oh my, so not killing eagles is going to change me electric bill? What rubbish.
Grandpa. Tell us again about cheap electricity and when people made good wages.