Carbon County leaders will get their first official chance Thursday to decide on — and set conditions for — an ambitious, controversial plan to build and operate dozens of small nuclear reactors, fabricate nuclear fuel and store it once spent on state trust land, as opponents are asking the county to slow down.
The Raceway Energy Campus proposed by Valar Atomics Inc. would include a natural gas plant to power manufacturing, labs and data center buildings until future reactors come online. Then the plant, with transmission lines, battery storage and substations, would provide energy as a back-up or for new uses or peak periods.
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Valar Atomics says its energy and industrial campus is a “conditional use” allowed under the “mining and grazing” zoning that the county placed on its site, about 640 acres leased from the Utah Trust Lands Administration near Wellington. That means the county can set conditions on how the project operates to mitigate impacts on issues such as health, safety, water use and the environment.
The company’s application for a conditional use permit seeks broad approvals beyond the current plans it describes. Valar wants the county to confirm that it agrees with the company’s reasoning for why all of its planned activities are allowed, and that changes within that outline — such as reactor designs or the number of reactors or buildings — would still be covered by the permit.
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The Salt Lake Tribune obtained the application through an open records request. The permit is the one significant agenda item at a special meeting called by the Carbon County Planning Commission for Thursday, starting at 6:30 p.m. Opponents say they plan to show up in numbers.
So far, there’s been no opportunity for residents and others to comment to government entities about Valar’s plans, because the company hasn’t requested any official action before now.