AI for Wyoming, By Wyoming
Wyoming is ground zero for a quiet but consequential transformation. A single proposed data center would draw five times the state’s residential electricity consumption. Meanwhile, AI is reshaping ranching, telehealth, wildfire response, and rural governance. The University of Wyoming has received $9 million in federal funding to launch the AI4WY initiative. Yet in the decisions driving this transformation — about energy rates, land use, job displacement, and the terms on which AI enters rural life — the everyday perspectives of Wyoming residents are largely absent.
This project is designed to change that. Using a student-supported mixed-methods approach, the team surveys Wyomingites about their understanding of and attitudes toward AI, asking not just whether they find it useful but whether they want it, on what terms, and who they think should benefit. A distinctive feature of the methodology is the use of AI-assisted narrative synthesis: survey and interview data are used to generate speculative narratives about how AI is already quietly appearing in everyday rural encounters — in farm equipment, in telehealth apps, in wildfire prediction systems — and what futures Wyomingites want to see or avoid.
The speculative narrative approach is adapted from scenario planning and futures research, providing a way to surface values-laden concerns that standard survey instruments often miss. Narratives explore dimensions including the convenience and invisibility of AI in daily tools; economic opportunities versus ecological costs from data center infrastructure; trust in non-local corporations; and identity-based questions about what kinds of technological futures are consistent with Wyoming rural life.
Findings will be synthesized into resident profiles, future narratives, and a policy-oriented white paper providing pilot data for larger external grant applications — including NSF Smart & Connected Communities, USDA NIFA AI in agricultural and food systems, and Rural Business Development Grants. The project is designed to position UW as a hub for scalable, community-engaged rural AI research that centers the people most affected by the technology’s arrival.