WHITEFISH, Mont. – Whitefish has become a model for how rural towns can adapt to the effects of climate change.

The jumpstart for the northwestern Montana town was the Resilience Dialogues in 2017, which partly led the city to produce its Climate Action Plan in 2018.

Steve Thompson, the plan’s former project manager, says the dialogues helped local leaders outline the issue with help from experts around the globe.

He says it also provided a valuable lesson about how to talk about this issue in rural, more conservative communities.

"There's a lot of people that are interested in being part of the solution,” he states. “They're not interested in just having big picture discussions about climate change, but they're willing to talk about climate change and they're not denying climate change if the frame is what we can do locally to be part of the solution."

A report just out from the American Association for the Advancement of Sciences highlights the Flathead Valley town's climate action work and the role Resilience Dialogues played.

Thompson says the Whitefish Climate Action Plan is a roadmap to resilience.

By 2025, the town aims to reduce emissions by 26% below 2016 levels through a solar farm, energy efficient buildings, transitioning to electric vehicles and other initiatives.

Whitefish also is putting measures in place to protect the town against its greatest threat – wildfires – through fire safety councils and collaboration with regional landowners.

Rachel Jacobson is senior program manager for the American Society of Adaptation Professionals, which helped facilitate the Resilience Dialogues. She says one key to the program is connecting communities that face the same risks.

"Although each community is special, each community is unique, helping people to understand that for every challenge you're facing with respect to climate change, there is most likely someone out there who's experienced something similar and that you can learn from," she states.

Thompson says he sees amazing climate action going on in big cities and thinks rural communities should figure out their own way to be part of the climate change conversation, too.

"Rural America is actually being impacted probably more dramatically just because this is where the land is, this is where the water is,” he stresses. “And we need to be at the table, but we need to be smart about how we engage rural America."


get more stories like this via email

Results of a new study from Michigan State University suggest farmers no longer have to choose between growing crops and harnessing solar power. They can do both on the same land.

The 25-year study of California farmland found farmers who added solar panels, a practice known as agrivoltaics, made more money per acre than those who did not. The research shows crops and solar work together, especially when panels are placed on low-yield acres, or spots not growing as much food due to poor soil or too much shade.

The research indicates the approach helps farmers boost income without reducing food production.

Jake Stid, a graduate student at Michigan State and lead author of the study, said farmers can also benefit through a system called Net Energy Metering.

"A return structure where farmers can directly in many cases, interconnect so they can use the electricity to offset their own needs, as well as sell excess generation, excess electricity back to the utility for a discounted rate," Stid outlined.

Researchers estimate California land now used for solar panels could have fed 86,000 people had it stayed in crops. The study looked at the trade-off between farming and solar energy, while critics warned it could worsen food security by reducing farmland.

Stid highlighted his team chose California's Central Valley as the focus of the research due to its significant contribution to both national and global food production, particularly for a variety of orchard crops.

"It's a really, really agriculturally valuable state and it also happens to be a pretty water-stressed state," Stid pointed out. "Specifically, the Central Valley has been experiencing pretty significant drought, as well as over allocation of water resources."

Some farmers expressed concern about solar panels shading crops, affecting growth and reducing yields. Stid hopes to expand his research on solar arrays and food production nationwide, contributing to the ongoing debate among farmers on how to use land sustainably, without harming food production.


get more stories like this via email

Lawmakers and climate change activists are speaking out against a rumored executive action by President Donald Trump to revoke tax-exempt statuses from climate nonprofits. One rumored change includes the removal of climate change from qualifying topics for the exemption.

Last Thursday in the Oval Office, Trump hinted environmental nonprofits could have their tax-exempt statuses scrutinized by the administration. Federal law currently bars a president from directly or indirectly ordering the Internal Revenue Service to investigate specific tax-exempt organizations.

Ruth Ann Norton, president and CEO of the nonpartisan Green and Healthy Homes Initiative, said she found the rumored executive actions troubling.

"We should not be talking about removing tax-exempt status from the civic good that comes from the work of nonprofits to prevent environmental issues that impair and impact and are harmful on people's lives," Norton contended.

Climate nonprofits are not the only organizations in Trump's crosshairs. He has suggested Harvard University should lose its tax-exempt status over defying demands from the administration dealing with diversity, admissions processes and antisemitism.

Tax-exempt status allows organizations to receive tax-deductible charitable contributions and not pay federal income tax.

Joelle Novey, director of the nonprofit Interfaith Power and Light in Maryland, the District of Columbia and Northern Virginia, said the actions may target climate nonprofits first but all nonprofits are at risk.

"There is no attack on civil society groups in the United States that isn't an attack on every one of us who expresses who we are by forming, supporting, volunteering and taking action through nonprofit organizations," Novey argued.

A federal judge last week ordered the Trump administration to unfreeze billions of dollars in climate and infrastructure funds previously targeted in an executive order on Trump's first day in office.


get more stories like this via email

As of today, Earth Day, more than 50 elected officials have signed a letter urging lawmakers to make oil and gas companies bear the cost of climate change.

The California Polluters Pay Superfund, which goes before the state Senate Judiciary Committee today, would assess a fee on large oil and gas companies to pay for programs that mitigate damage from climate change.

Ahmad Zahra, a council member in Fullerton, signed onto the letter sponsored by the group Elected Officials to Protect America.

"Throughout the years, these large oil companies were really not necessarily telling the truth about air pollution," Zahra pointed out. "Just like we've seen in oil spills and ground pollution, the responsible party has to pay for it."

The Western States Petroleum Association opposes the bill, saying it would lead to higher gas prices. The bill directs the California Environmental Protection Agency to determine how much climate change has cost the state from 1990 to 2024. Federal data show California has suffered 46 natural disasters linked to climate change since 1980, each resulting in more than $1 billion in losses, with $250 billion from the Los Angeles firestorm alone.

Marisol Rubio, a council member in San Ramon, said 40% of the funds would be directed to low-income communities most affected by fossil fuel pollution.

"Those funds can then be used to better manage and correct and abate the pollution that not only already exists but that will come inevitably in the future, until we are able to be independent of fossil fuels," Rubio explained.

Advocates said right now, everyday Californians foot the bill for climate change in the form of higher taxes, insurance rates and utility bills, as well as via medical expenses for pollution-related illness.