Profile of Western Fuels Association

 

The National energy policy of the mid-1970s and 1980s encouraged utilities to use America's abundant coal reserves for generating electricity. The Federal government, as a matter of policy, discouraged use of imported oil and natural gas while encouraging coal combustion and nuclear fission for electricity production, and exploring the use of tar sands and oil shale, renewable resources, and coal gasification.

This was precisely the era during which rural electric cooperatives and municipal utilities – which had enjoyed preference in the use of hydropower generated at Federal dams – were told no new commitments would be made in development of additional hydropower projects. If they needed more electricity (and they did), they would have to produce it themselves. In good-faith response, consumer-owned utilities invested close to $40 billion in state-of-the-art coal-fired power plants, coal mines, and coal transportation facilities. At the same time, railroads and coal producers (especially in the Powder River Basin of Wyoming and Montana) invested billions more to effectively tap America's vast coal reserves and bring them to the market. Western Fuels Association became part of that "coal chain" in 1973.

Western Fuels is a cooperative business. Our members, who in turn are owned by their consumers, own us. Thus, our enterprise is not-for-profit and consumer-driven from one end to the other.

Much of the 17 million tons of coal we generally supply each year is purchased from coal companies operating mines in the Powder River Basin. The Powder River Basin has the largest reserves of low-sulfur coal in the nation. In essence, the PRB is the single most important energy resource on earth because it is the most important energy resource for the world's most important economy – that of the United States.

The coal reserves in the PRB are federally owned and the operators pay the U.S. Treasury to lease what they mine. The coal is mined in strict conformance with air and water quality standards. The land is reclaimed for productive use even as mining is underway. In fact, Western Fuels Association and one of our members, Basin Electric Power Cooperative were among the few companies supporting federal surface mine reclamation reform at the time it was proposed.

Western Fuels is also a coal-producer in our own right. Through affiliated companies we operate the Dry Fork Mine near Gillette, Wyoming and the New Horizon Mine in southwestern Colorado at Nucla. Dry Fork and New Horizon are both surface mines.

Our role as fuel supplier involves us in rail transportation of coal from mines to power plants. We contract with railroads like the BNSF Railway and the Union Pacific Railway to haul coal to our members in unit trains of approximately 115 rail cars, each containing over 110 tons of coal. Western Fuels manages a fleet of over 1600 rail cars dedicated to our Members' use. We also operate the Escalante-Western Railway in New Mexico connecting Lee Ranch Mine to Escalante Station..