John Barrasso: “I rise today to pass important legislation in the State of Wyoming. This bill has only to do with Wyoming and no other…”

“I rise today to pass important legislation in the State of Wyoming. This bill has only to do with Wyoming and no other State. It is H.R. 3415, the Pilot Butte Power Plant Conveyance Act. It allows the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation to transfer the ownership of the facility to stakeholders in my home State of Wyoming. The Pilot Butte power plant is owned by the Federal Government, but it has not been in service since 2008. It closed when it became too costly to operate. So it has been sitting idle there in Wyoming in a small area of 2\1/2\ acres for the past 15 years. It is owned by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, and they are planning to demolish it. To be clear, we are talking about a mothballed hydroelectric structure. We are talking about 2 acres of Bureau of Reclamation land. This is essentially 1\1/2\ football fields in size. That is how small of a footprint this is. Well, the Midvale Irrigation District in Pavillion, WY, reached out to the Wyoming congressional delegation--all three members of the delegation--saying that they were willing to take ownership of this power plant that has been sitting idle for 15 years and ready to be demolished. Midvale Irrigation proposed this transfer as a solution to provide energy to local users. The local people right there came to us. They said that they will make the needed repairs to bring this power station back into operation.…”