Kemmerer City Administrator Brian Muir joined SVI to discuss industry growth for south Lincoln County and the workers coming as part of construction work on nuclear energy plant.

He says Liaison for South Lincoln County Economic Development Corporation Stephan Allen has been busy reaching out to towns and cities in the county to coordinate incoming workers for the nuclear plant.

“We’ve got to work together,” Muir said. “Making sure we’re communicating and messaging properly.”

He says he also spoke with Allen about a heavy industrial site just south of Kemmerer. He says there might be some additional businesses coming in. He says some of these cities have also put in money to fund Allen’s position.

“We’re hoping for it to last a couple of years at least,” Muir said. “We see what he’s doing can actually bring great economic benefit to all of the communities in this region including the whole county.”

He says they are doing everything they can to keep the coal industry where it needs to be. He says it is a big source of funding for schools. He also says a big focus is to get things ready from an infrastructure perspective.

“TriSite, they’re doing humate is their plan,” Muir said. “They’ve excavated a little bit out there south of town. We’re hoping they’re going to put up their building and start hiring employees.”

He says he is not sure of the tonnage TriSite will potentially use. However, he says one big company is Glenrock Energy and according to the city administrator that company is still working hard on finding funding.

“To get that coal to syngas to hydrogen to ammonia conversion up and going,” Muir said. “We’re hoping they can get that done, off the ground enough to get the mine on board…helping to pay enough to open the road so that we can have the kind of tonnage they need in the long term.”

“1.5 million tons of coal per year is what they were hoping for which is a con- siderable amount of coal. I think, at least replace some of the coal we would lose from the power plant.”

He says what he means by “open up the road” is relocating US-30 heading in from Kemmerer from the west side. He also says legislators are doing everything they can to protect those funds for that project. He says the state has set aside $15 million for it.

“Originally that was half of what was going to be required,” Muir said. “One challenge is the coal mine needs to come up with the remainder and they’re going to need to come up with more because of the course of inflation.”

He says they are hoping that will all come together and the city will continue to work to find ways to continue to innovate with coal.