Pioneer Day – Remembering Utah’s History

On July 24th, 1847 Utah pioneers arrived in the Salt Lake Valley and famously stated “This is the place.” In an era of hardship and scarcity, these pioneers engrained aspects of sustainability into their culture out of necessity. Brigham Young, a leader of the first Mormon settlers to arrive in Salt Lake once said “Learn to sustain yourselves: lay up grain and flour, and save it against a day of scarcity.” Without the guarantee of food supply, people learned to conserve their resources, waste little, and save for the future – skills mastered by Native Americans long before.

Times have changed, but a focus on securing future prosperity has not. People today are still concerned about adequately providing for their families. However, a culture of excess in the modern United States often creates barriers to prioritizing thoughtful consumption and awareness of waste that is produced. Still, the need remains, and sustainability in Utah has changed accordingly: from conserving morsels of food to implementing large-scale technological solutions.

The Utah Governor’s Office of Energy Development website claims: “As Utah’s population is set to nearly double by 2050, our energy demands will increase. To that end, the Utah Energy Action Plan has been developed to help OED meet its objectives and deliver results to the residents of Utah through a disciplined approach to the management and execution of its programs.” Wasatch Resource Recovery is excited to play a role in the evolving history of sustainability that is a part of Utah and its development. From pioneering the western frontier, to pioneering the frontier of renewable energy, Utah stands out – as Governor Gary Herbert states in his Energy Summit Video – “as a crossroads of global innovation.”