After serving three terms as a Republican statehouse representative, lifelong Sheridan County resident Cyrus Western has assumed the helm of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Region 8 office in Denver, Colorado.
The 35-year-old commercial real estate manager who grew up hunting and fishing in some of the most pristine areas of the Rockies will oversee one the agency’s largest geographic and most consequential districts, one that is experiencing major population growth, as well as historic shifts in industry and economies — all of which are shaped by a changing climate.
Western’s boss, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin, laid out the agency’s agenda earlier this month declaring “the greatest and most consequential day of deregulation in U.S. history” — one in which the federal agency is “driving a dagger straight into the heart of the climate change religion to drive down cost of living for American families, unleash American energy, bring auto jobs back to the U.S. and more.”
Perhaps less bombastic, Western says he fully embraces Zeldin’s vision and initiatives to rollback or “reconsider” dozens of key federal environmental laws, including the Clean Power Plan and the landmark 2009 “endangerment finding” that greenhouse gases cause harm.
The reason is simple, according to Western. For too long, he said, the federal government has imposed environmental laws that, though many were well-meaning, ignore the economic implications for businesses and homes.
“Of course, we want clean air and we want clean water and all that stuff,” Western told WyoFile. “And we’re going to do our darndest to ensure that the industry can create jobs and fulfill their objectives, and make sure we’ve got really good blue-collar jobs — not just in Wyoming, but of course across Region 8 and the nation.”
WyoFile caught up with Western by phone Monday to discuss his new role at one of the most influential federal agencies. Here’s an overview of that interview, which has been edited and condensed for readability.
WyoFile: What are your first 30-day priorities?
Cyrus Western: I think [mine and EPA Administrator Zeldin’s agenda] is sending the message around the region, saying, ‘Hey, we want to work with you.’ This is about engaging the states and saying, ‘Hey, Montana knows Montana best. Wyoming knows Wyoming best. Utah knows Utah best.’ It’s less of us beating our chest as the big, bad feds and how we’re going to tell you how it’s going to be. It’s much more about, ‘Hey, let’s have a conversation about the problems you’re facing.’ How can we help you? How can we build that collaborative partnership so we can meet all the objectives that we want?
Obviously, I was appointed by President [Donald] Trump, and I’m very excited to help carry his agenda. But I want to get to all the stakeholders. You know, if the Sierra Club asks me for a meeting, I will absolutely grant it to them. I want to hear from everybody across the spectrum — big stakeholders, small stakeholders. I want to engage with all of them.
The Biden administration took things in a direction that, obviously, I don’t particularly agree with. I think President Trump has been really clear that he wants to take a very different direction and work with the states, help encourage industry, but also simultaneously ensuring that the communities do have access to clean water, that their air is clean, that kind of stuff.
WF: What’s unique about Region 8?
CW: It’s huge, right? I think we’re the biggest region geographically, but also I think we’re the smallest in terms of population size. Obviously, it’s a big extractives region. It’s oil and gas, it’s coal, it’s bentonite. But it’s more than just that. There’s heavy industry here. There’s refining. [Agriculture] is a really big deal in Region 8. North Dakota and South Dakota, those are big grain producers and ag states.
WF: Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon has pushed back against the EPA’s power plant rules, the regional haze program and myriad other environmental initiatives that are now under reconsideration at EPA. How deep into the weeds are you on these matters and their implications region-wide?
CW: These are really important decisions. Clean Power 2.0, wherever you’re at on the spectrum, the reality is it has made generating affordable baseload power — it has made it more expensive. I think we kind of see that, you know, across the region and across the country. At the end of the day, I think one of the greatest achievements of society is delivering really affordable, reliable power. Clean Power 2.0, I’m not saying I can’t appreciate its intent and what it was trying to do, but the reality was, it was having some of these big negative impacts and side effects on grid reliability. Grid reliability is huge.
The vast majority of Americans don’t realize what a big deal it is that they can walk into their house and turn on the lights and cook breakfast or dinner or, you know, run their hobby wood shop out in the garage. You start scaling it up, of course, to the industrial and commercial level, really affordable, dispatchable power is incredibly important. As EPA Administrator Zeldin has talked about, that is a legacy that we absolutely want, that’s an objective we intend to achieve.
So whether it’s the Good Neighbor Rule, or Clean Power Plan 2.0 or regional haze, or any of these kinds of things, I think the approach is, ‘How does this impact — obviously, the environment, of course — but also, what’s the economic impact? What impact is this going to have on your blue-collar worker, whether it’s in Denver, whether it’s in Cheyenne, or whether it’s in Broadus, Montana. That’s kind of one of the big questions, I think, that has been ignored for a long time with a lot of these regulations. And that’s one of the main drivers of why we intend to really go after and amend some of these big rules and rulemakings that we’ve been seeing over the last 10, 15-plus years.
WF: What have you heard over the years from Wyoming conservation groups and residents that has evolved your understanding or changed your mind regarding environmental and human health implications of energy development?
CW: The reality is, the phone you’re calling on, that we’re talking on, it has precious rare earths in it. The rare earths in your phone and in your laptop — all that stuff — a 12-year-old child in Central Africa is getting paid absolutely nothing, is getting exposed to egregiously dangerous chemicals and processes — all that kind of stuff. Or we can do that kind of stuff right here in America, where we can hold stakeholders and industry to high reclamation and environmental standards. We can create really good, middle-class jobs along the way. So that’s the one lens through which I view a lot of this type of stuff. I think having that [mining] here, being able for us to control that process and create really good middle-class jobs along the way — that’s a big deal.
WF: What will be your approach to working with Tribal Nations?
CW: I’m starting an outreach initiative to every single one of those 28 tribes [in Region 8]. We are the regulator when it comes to air, water and soil. And I want to have that relationship and say, ‘What are the things that are concerning you? How can we help you?’ Any of the tribes are ones that I want to hear from and engage with and really see where we can find common ground and start solving problems.
WF: Administrator Zeldin said EPA is going to reconsider the Social Cost of Greenhouse Gases initiative. How concerned are you about climate change and its social cost?
CW: Obviously, climate change has been a big topic for many years. But I think the component out of that is, what [are the] impacts of these policies that we saw from the Biden administration and the Obama administration and Clean Power 2.0 — and all that kind of stuff? I don’t think there’s ever really been a discussion about: What impact is this going to have on the bottom line for just your average folks, whether it’s in downtown Denver, or Wyoming, or Bismarck, [North Dakota]? What impact is this having on them within their day-to-day lives in terms of affordability?
We want to have less pollution and less CO2 in the atmosphere — no question. But I don’t think there’s ever been a really thoroughly robust discussion about, ‘Hey, let’s ensure that we are meeting maximum standards of reliability, that we are doing everything in our power to ensure that those utility bills are low.’ The quickest way to hurt poor people is to start increasing the price of utility bills, which we’ve seen. Those 10%, 15%, 20% increases — that hurts. It’s not just another $5 or $10 a month for some of these people. It’s an extra $50, $100-plus a month. For those folks who are barely making it, that’s very real to them, and that’s something I’m very conscious of, and I hope that aspect of this can be more heavily included in the dialog moving forward.
WF: With this high-level appointment, most Americans are just hearing about you for the first time, including a racially charged 2020 social media post that earned a lot of backlash. What have you taken away from that experience?
CW: I apologized. I stand by that apology now and I will always stand by that apology. I got to engage with [Albany County] Sheriff [Aaron] Appelhans and I got to know him, and he’s a good guy. He wants to do a good job. He cares about the safety of his community. He wants to treat people with respect and dignity and be a good law enforcement officer and fulfill the duties of his role faithfully and responsibly.
That’s something I quickly learned through my engagement with him over the last five years or so. I see him at the Capitol and I always kind of just go over and say ‘Hey’ to him and see how Albany County is doing and all that stuff. So that’s what made me feel like a doofus about the whole thing, was just getting to getting to know the guy and realizing that, ‘Man, he’s just a good guy who wants to do a good job.’
Any kind of mistakes you make, I think it’s about learning and engaging with the folks you impact. No matter who you are, the color of your skin or whatever your religion is, we’re all here trying to do our best, and we’re people. That was what I came to learn about Sheriff Appelhans, and I believe that to this day.
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