Let me start with the fact that the federal government controls 61.9% of Idaho\u2019s land or about 32.8 of its 52.9 million acres. Unfortunately, as the players in Washington change so do the objectives for our land. We can all remember Lava Ridge where the BLM gave final approval in Dec. 2024 to a 104,000 acre 200 plus wind turbine project with towers up to 600 feet tall. This approval was overwhelmingly rejected by officials across Idaho yet the federal agency greenlit it anyway. While it was the same federal system that reversed this decision it was totally dependent on the fact that Trump halted it by executive order. This is the real problem in dealing with the Fed\u2019s. Every 4 to 8 years elections happen and as administrations change along with the rules, so how can you trust them? Think about the fact that a rare earth mine or a nuclear waste repository is a commitment measured in decades. So, betting on the goodwill of whoever happens to be in charge is the wrong way to secure decades-long risk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Just look at how our forests have been mismanaged for decades and Idaho has repeatedly concluded federal management was inadequate. This is why we have stewardship agreements, Good Neighbor Authority timber work and Little’s executive orders directing state agencies to help the feds manage national forests. While the Forest Service cannot be held totally responsible for the management of our forests, they did play an important role, which is why the state had to step in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We have permitted and even invited Data Centers and a huge expansion of Micron to become part of our infrastructure offering broad sales tax exemptions with essentially no strings attached on water and power. Only now in 2026 is the legislature moving a bipartisan bill to sunset those exemptions, narrow them and critically require new Data Centers to pay power rates that totally cover the cost of serving the facility and give water providers advanced notice of consumption. Rep. Gannon and others are explicitly arguing the deals should guarantee public benefits. In simple terms the state is belatedly trying to attach on enforceable water and power commitments that weren\u2019t secured the first time and the fix apparently would only apply going forward and not retroactively to Meta. Even with the announcement of the Micron expansion there is no mention of the fact that these FAB expansions will also require huge amounts of water and electricity. While Micron is a home-grown company that will bring jobs, a larger tax base, national security relevance and research capacity they also need to be tied down in writing to the use of water, power, waste treatment, and removal deadlines that protect Idahoans. Agreements should be enforceable and in writing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Idaho has a huge growth pattern and while growth has its positives it also has its negatives. This MOU signed by Governor Little in 2024 to accept more radioactive material for storage in Idaho needs to be examined carefully and the state needs to get a enforceable written agreement as to the specifics that will be required for both the acceptance and storage of this new waste. Aside from the Batt\/Andrus agreement of 1995 I find that their predecessors and successors have been quick to bring growth to our state but slow to have the details set down for how that growth is approached and dealt with in by future administrations. With the exception of Governor Batt Idaho has had a Pattern of Unsecured Commitments when you look at the INl, Lava Ridge, the Data Centers build out and Microns expansion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Let\u2019s look at this pattern of unsecured commitments.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n INL waste disposal (1950s\u20131980s) – Idaho accepted –<\/strong> Federal weapons\/research fuel reprocessing at INTEC, with liquid waste sent to a deep injection well and percolation ponds over the aquifer. There was No<\/strong> requirement to solidify before disposal, no binding removal obligation, no aquifer-liability guarantee. Liquid went into the ground before treatment. This was Corrected only decades later: calcining began 1963; contamination plumes remain under cleanup. The correction was reactive, not preventive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 1995 Idaho Settlement Agreement –<\/strong> Idaho sued and negotiated caps on imports of nuclear waste plus dated federal removal obligations which is the protection that should have existed from the start. This was the correction. It only exists because trust had already failed and had to be replaced with enforceable law. Litigation was backed and effective, but bought at the price of a court fight. The DOE has since missed several of its milestones anyway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lava Ridge Wind (2019\u20132025) –<\/strong> A federal (BLM) siting process on public land near Twin Falls: 104,000 acres, 200+ turbines up to 660 ft. high. There was No<\/strong> effective weight for near-unanimous state, local, tribal, and Minidoka-preservation opposition in the approval itself. What saved the day here was a decision reversed by executive order (Jan 2025) and Interior cancellation (Aug 2025); Idaho passed the \u201cGone with the Lava Ridge\u201d Act. Idaho won but only after a change of administration and Trumps executive order to cancel the project.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Data centers \/ Meta Kuna (2020\u20132026) –<\/strong> The operator was given broad sales-tax exemptions under a 2020 law to attract large data centers; Meta\u2019s Kuna campus came in under it. There were no requirements that operators cover their full cost of power to protect ratepayers, or secure and treat their water. A 2026 bipartisan bill would sunset\/narrow the breaks and require new centers to pay full cost-of-service power rates but reportedly not retroactively to Meta. Once again Correcting after the fact.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Micron fabs ID1 \/ ID2 (2022\u20132026) \u2013<\/strong> A $50B expansion of two memory fabs in Boise; $6.2B federal CHIPS funding plus state\/local incentives; a workforce toward the mid-teens of thousands. Public commitments on the fab\u2019s very large water and energy draw are not clearly secured; Micron\u2019s CEO has flagged energy infrastructure as a constraint. Not yet tested. While Micron is different in kind as it is a homegrown employer with strategic value but with the same open question on securing water and power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Nuclear-waste MOU (2026 pending) –<\/strong> A DOE MOU to pursue accepting ~1\/3 of the national spent-fuel\/HLW stockpile at INL, over the Snake River aquifer. We need written, binding removal deadlines, disposal prohibitions, aquifer guarantees, and the 1995 protections must all be resolved \u201cin a mutually agreeable manner\u201d The key word being \u201c LATER\u201d. These particulars have not yet been decided. This is the real chance to break the pattern by making<\/u> the protections conditions a precedent before the waste is here, and the leverage, is gone.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n It is time for Idaho\u2019s elected officials to start worrying about the people who have voted them into office instead of the corporations that pay for their reelections campaigns as their record to date is pretty dismal from my prospective. Idahoans have been traditionally conservative but unfortunately in the past 20 years this has not shown in how they have been managing our state. From the huge increase in the state budget from 7 to 14 billion dollars in 6 short years to not having the courage to do something about the illegals that we pay 400 million of our tax dollars to educate their children and pay for their medical bills.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019m sure we all understand that growth has a price but why do Idaho\u2019s taxpayers always get stuck with the bill. It seems to me that we never have had a plan for Idaho\u2019s growth and it shows with the lack of infrastructure that is necessary to handle the huge changes we have experienced in the Treasure Valley. Our elected officials don\u2019t want to bite the bullet and make the necessary changes to shift the cost of infrastructure to these huge corporate ventures. It is time they pay their fair share. Our elected officials are by no means stupid but it appears that they must realize that they can\u2019t keep sticking homeowners and small businesses with the bill for this growth. It is time that the corporations who are benefiting the most from this growth to pay what they owe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n People are moving here for the same reasons I did 33 years ago but many are finding that it is not all peaches and ice cream. The Treasure Valley continues to expand west, and the building never seems to cease while the infrastructure is constantly playing catch-up. While this new agreement with the federal government to take on 1\/3 of the country\u2019s Nuclear Waste may sound like a good idea, the devil will be in the details. I\u2019m all for growth in our state, but let’s be honest, it is time for someone besides the taxpayers to pick up the bill. It is time the corporations who thrive on this growth paid their fair share. It is also time for our elected officials to stop jumping into the water before knowing how deep or dangerous it is. How about some real common sense when it comes to taking on this huge obligation of making Idaho a repository for 1\/3 of America’s nuclear waste.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Our Lt. Governor says that things have changed and they are different this time. Well, Mr. Bedke, keep in mind that the half-life of nuclear reactor fuel, such as that used in submarines, varies depending on the isotopes that are present. An example is that plutonium 239 has a <\/strong>half-life of 24,000 years, while isotopes like strontium\u00a0 90 and cesium 137 have half-lives of about 30 years. <\/strong>I doubt that once we accept this spent fuel, it will be returnable with a \u201cReturn to Sender\u201d note, so be sure you dot the i\u2019s and cross your T\u2019s before signing on the dotted line with the Federal Government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe Get the Government We Deserve\u201d.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Let me start with the fact that the federal government controls 61.9% of Idaho\u2019s land or about 32.8 of its 52.9 million acres. Unfortunately, as the players in Washington change so do the objectives for our land. We can all remember Lava Ridge where the BLM gave final approval in Dec. 2024 to a 104,000 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20215,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[235],"tags":[1609,906,154],"class_list":["post-20214","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bobs-words-of-wisdom","tag-inl","tag-micron","tag-nuclear-waste","cat-235-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20214","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20214"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20214\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20216,"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20214\/revisions\/20216"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20215"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gemstatepatriot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}