As WA’s coal ban looms, Montana wind fills only some of the energy gap

Climate Lab is a Seattle Times initiative that explores the effects of climate change in the Pacific Northwest and beyond. The project is funded in part by The Bullitt Foundation, CO2 Foundation, Jim and Birte Falconer, Mike and Becky Hughes, Henry M. Jackson Foundation, Martin-Fabert Foundation, Craig McKibben and Sarah Merner, University of Washington and Walker Family Foundation, and its fiscal sponsor is the Seattle Foundation.

STILLWATER COUNTY, Mont. — Near a dusty road over rolling hills, clouds hung low above the jagged peaks of the Beartooth Mountains just outside Yellowstone National Park.

On the plains of this windswept landscape, wind turbines whistled as they spun, each thin, white scythe scraping the sky.

This was the Beaver Creek wind farm, one of Puget Sound Energy’s new