By Keaton Peters for Inside Climate News.
Broadcast version by Freda Ross for Texas News Service reporting for the Solutions Journalism Network-Public News Service Collaboration

Months before the Texas Panhandle erupted with destructive wildfires, fire crews in Borger were igniting fire intentionally on a seven-mile, roughly 250-foot wide ribbon of land on the edge of town.

The prescribed burn in November removed dense grass and brush next to homes on the southwest side of the town. When the Windy Deuce fire ravaged the region in February, the prescribed burn area acted as a fireproof wall that stopped the blaze in its tracks.

"I would bet my next paycheck, if that black line had not been there, we would have lost homes and, it's quite possible, lives. There's no doubt in my mind," said Archie Stone, wildland fire coordinator for Borger, located 50 miles northeast of Amarillo. Stone is a state certified and insured burn manager in Texas and has spent decades fighting wildfires around the country.

The Windy Deuce fire burned an estimated 144,045 acres before it was contained. Nearby, the Smokehouse Creek fire burned more than a million acres as it became the largest wildfire in Texas history, decimating multiple counties and crossing into Oklahoma. At least two people died, hundreds of buildings burned and thousands of livestock were killed.

The region has seen fires throughout its history, with 90 percent of the largest wildfires in Texas recorded in the months between January and May, most of them in west Texas and the panhandle. After massive fires in 2006 claimed 12 lives, the Borger fire chief and city council looked for ways to protect their town. They turned to prescribed burning.

Before modern firefighting and fire suppression techniques, fires across forests and grasslands were a part of the Earth's natural cycles. Prescribed burning is an ancient technique still practiced by some Native Americans. In the range ecosystem that dominates the United States from the Texas panhandle through the Great Plains, land managers and firefighters are recommending prescribed burns to protect communities and restore natural fire cycles. But in Texas, prescribed burning has yet to be widely accepted.

Climate change continues to increase the wildfire risk in Texas, which is part of the region in the United States most affected by high temperatures and long dry spells. Climate scientists warn that the wildfire season in the state is likely to grow longer and more intense.

"We've had a trend of increasing temperatures in the state of Texas for several decades, and that trend is expected to continue," said John Nielsen-Gammon, the state climatologist and a professor at Texas A&M University.

Wildfires thrive in dry and windy conditions. More swelteringly hot days contribute to increased rates of evaporation. "Essentially, that means things dry out faster between rainfall," Nielsen-Gammon said. "That would tend to lengthen the period of time over the course of the year in which wildfire is possible."

Long dry and unseasonably hot periods are "where climate change comes in," said Katharine Hayhoe, a professor at Texas Tech University and chief scientist for The Nature Conservancy. "It's the difference between smaller, more easily contained fires, and really large out of control fires."

By 2050, the number of days with wildfire danger in Texas could increase by as many as 40 days per year, according to the Desert Research Institute at the University of Nevada at Reno. Its recent study analyzed a global climate model simulation and various wildfire danger indicators and found that high heat and dry periods will lengthen the wildfire season.

In the days leading up to this year's fires, temperatures in the region surpassed 80 degrees, with the cities of Amarillo and Borger measuring record-high temperatures for late February. The panhandle was not in drought, but higher temperatures quickly dried out tall grass. Then, the winds came.

The Smokehouse Creek fire spread from 40,000 acres on Feb 27 to more than 900,000 within two days. The fire began on Feb. 26 north of Stinnett, Texas. State officials are investigating the fire, but Xcel Energy, a major U.S. electric and natural gas company, has acknowledged that "its facilities appear to have been involved" in igniting the blaze.

From Stinnett, the fire headed east and burned about 80 percent of both Hemphill and Roberts counties. "It was a massive monster of a wildfire," said Andy Holloway, a former rancher in the small city of Canadian, Texas. He was among the lucky ones, with no damage to his home, land or cattle.

Holloway is the Hemphill County agent in agriculture and natural resources for the Texas A&M Agrilife Extension. He said a wet spring and summer in 2023 brought about enormous grass growth. "Dry dead grass in the winter is like standing gasoline," Holloway said. "All it needed was a spark."

Eastern red cedars add to the risk. The trees, native to the Great Plains, were planted intentionally in Texas to control normal wind patterns but now provide ready tinder for fast-spreading fires.

Former wildland firefighter Morgan Treadwell works as a range specialist for the Texas A&M Agrilife Extension and she is an advocate for prescribed burns. Among the wildfire risk factors of fuel, wind and dryness, "the one that we can manage is fuel loads," said Treadwell, who is also an associate professor at Texas A&M University. "We can do that with livestock and we can do that with fire."

Texas state law protects the right of private landowners to ignite fires on their own land when a burn ban is not in effect. Certified and insured burn managers are typically hired to conduct burns, and they are allowed to use prescribed fire during a burn ban. Landowners or any burn managers they hire can be liable for harm if a fire they start enters and scorches someone else's land. Liability remains even if no crops or structures are damaged.

Certified burn managers are trained to monitor weather and wind conditions and to evaluate if the land has become dangerously dry. They also survey the land and plan how to use natural firebreaks to help contain the burn. But "weather is the most unpredictable factor in all of this," Tradwell said, noting that prescribed burning comes with an inherent risk.

The seven-mile prescribed burn near Borger was located on the Four Sixes Ranch, which was a willing partner with the city. But Texas landowners generally are cautious if not reluctant toward prescribed burns.

"People are scared to use a tool like controlled burning for fear they'll be sued," Holloway said, adding that "there's been a few people that have really been heavy handed" filing or threatening lawsuits.

Treadwell agreed that ranching culture is divided over prescribed burns. "Some neighbors can get pretty hateful when it comes to one neighbor burning and the other neighbor not wanting it," she said.

The Texas A&M Forest Service helps fight fires that overwhelm local departments. It has authority to conduct prescribed burns in state forests, although land in Texas is overwhelmingly owned by individuals and private corporations. The forest service offers reimbursements to qualifying landowners who do prescribed burns, but owners bear the upfront cost and legal liability.

Karen Stafford, a wildfire prevention program coordinator for the forest service, said the city of Borger "set the bar high in showing the effectiveness of prescribed burns and what it can do in community protection."

Stone, who now oversees Borger's wildlands, said public engagement on prescribed burning has been crucial. Stone, who joined the fire department there in 2011, said fire personnel continue to personally visit houses near future burn areas and distribute pamphlets with information and a phone number to call with questions. He said the department works hard to engage and meet with residents, the city council and the mayor before starting new prescribed burns. "Now people don't even think twice," he said. "We put out notifications, and they know they're going to see some smoke in the air. They understand why we're doing it."

The Texas A&M Forest Service also encourages cities and counties to develop community wildfire protection plans that identify ways to lower wildfire risk and to protect lives and structures. As of this month, only three municipalities-including the city of Borger-and two counties in the Texas Panhandle have a community wildfire protection plan.

The state forest service's wildfire protection plan contains no mention of climate change, rising temperatures or heat. Stafford would not comment on global climate change as a factor in the state's wildfire plans. The forest service publishes quarterly wildfire outlook reports as well as daily assessments based on actual weather conditions at more than 150 stations across the state.

The wildfire outlook report published in December for the "dormant" season of winter and early spring predicted "fire season will be normal to below normal."

As climate change spurs more days of hot dry weather, the months and weeks of ideal conditions for prescribed burns will shorten. Still, after a historically destructive 2024 wildfire season, the success of Borger's prescribed burn has generated interest in that mitigation technique.

In the town of Canadian, Holloway knows ranchers who have lost everything and he thinks residents across Texas may "reconsider" their aversion to prescribed burns.

"Fire is a good tool to use," he said. "I think this is a big wake up call."


Keaton Peters wrote this article for Inside Climate News.


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A Detroit suburb is undergoing a transformation with funds from the American Rescue Plan Act and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.

Canton Charter Township is 31 miles west of Detroit with more than 98,000 residents. It is investing in downtown revitalization, infrastructure upgrades and future industries such as EVs and clean energy.

Anne Marie Graham-Hudak, supervisor of Canton Township, highlighted the energy-efficient projects, which include buildings following energy policy.

"We also are building a fourth fire station," Graham-Hudak pointed out. "We're going to utilize geothermal and solar. We are going to be the first in Michigan headed for zero energy, hopefully, carbon emissions. That's one of our goals."

For three years, Canton has earned Michigan's Green Community Gold status, a prestigious award recognizing communities for their significant efforts in environmental sustainability.

Nearly $23 million is being invested to expand electric vehicle charging stations across Michigan, with more than 40 stations planned for the Canton area. Graham-Hudak noted in her lifetime, she has never seen this level of federal funding come directly down to the community.

"Right now we're doing a groundbreaking for a downtown area to stir economic development in and that was part of ARPA funds," Graham-Hudak added. "We were able to fund during the COVID, we were able to fund our first responders."

The money is also expected to create significant job growth by upgrading infrastructure and supporting the expansion of new industries.


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By Jessica Scott-Reid for Sentient.
Broadcast version by Kathryn Carley for Maine News Service reporting for the Sentient-Public News Service Collaboration

Last month the U.S. Department of Justice indicted two employees of Russian-state funded news outlet RT, formerly known as "Russia Today," for paying a content creation outfit called Tenet Media to push a wide range of climate misinformation on social media. Included in the raft of misinformation are false social media posts downplaying the very real climate impact of meat, according to a new report from the group Climate Action Against Disinformation, CAAD.

The Russian government wants no part of climate action - including the kind that shifts diets from meat-heavy to plant-rich - political researchers surmise. While Tenet's site has since gone dark, these influencers continue to post misinformation on social media channels, including Rumble, X, YouTube and TikTok.

Social Media Influencers Spread Misinformation About Meat's Climate Impact

In the report, the climate disinformation researchers looked at 69 websites and social media accounts belonging to Tenet Media and its founders, Lauren Chen and Liam Donovan, and six affiliated content creators, from September 1, 2023, to September 23, 2024. During that time, influencers with over 16 million combined total followers and subscribers made 183 total posts nabbing 23,555,000 views and 1,048,902 shares and likes. According to the indictment, Chen and Donovan were aware the funds were coming from Russia. Still, the influencers characterize themselves as "victims" of the campaign.

Some of the misinformation content was, and continued to be monetized, according to the report. Some examples include mocking prominent climate activists, such as Greta Thunberg, as well as standing up against "disruptive" lifestyle changes, like replacing gas stoves with electric models, and eating less meat. Eating a more plant-forward, less meat-heavy diet is one of the most effective forms of individual climate action, according to Project Drawdown, a non-profit aiming to help the world reduce carbon emissions.

Other posts feature the conspiracy theory that Bill Gates is trying to rid the world of animal farming and replace livestock with lab grown meat and bug burgers, while others claim Americans are "revolting" against the United Nations' call for western countries to cut back on meat consumption.

From Buzzfeed Reporter to Pro-Trump Influencer

One notable content creator associated with Tenet, Benny Johnson, posts often, though not accurately, on the topic of meat-eating. Johnson falsely characterizes voluntary recommendations to shift diets towards eating more plants as authoritarianism. In his 2023 video regarding the UN's food system road map, Johnson said that "fascists" want to rid Americans of their self-governance and autonomy, in part by taking away their meat.

"The purpose of this is control," Johnson said. "If they can control your food supply, if they can control your energy supply, if they can control your transportation, then you don't have freedom. You are a slave."

The facts: meat has a massive climate impact. Meat and dairy production are responsible for between 11 and 20 percent of greenhouse gas emissions, and is a documented drain on our planet's water and land reserves, and a leading cause of deforestation and ocean degradation. But efforts to change meat consumption are not mandatory.

At the same time, Johnson creates branded content for meat companies, while telling followers to "Eat like an American," and offering discount codes. Meat companies use Johnson as a spokesperson to sell their products, and just last month, Johnson shared a video entitled "Women eat raw steak to support Trump."

Johnson wasn't always a right wing influencer. He was once considered a credible journalist, working for Buzzfeed covering "viral" American politics. He was fired by the outlet in 2015, for plagiarizing 41 articles. One year later he was accused of plagiarism again, by the conservative outlet Independent Journal Review.

Why Russia Wants Climate Misinformation to Proliferate

Russia is the world's fourth greatest emitting country, and is warming four times faster than the Earth. Yet according to its own government, Russia benefits from climate change and from maintaining global reliance on fossil fuels - an approach debunked by scientists.

Kostiantyn Kalashnikov and Elena Afanasyeva, the RT staffers named in the U.S. indictment, allegedly paid out nearly $10 million to the Tennessee company to "create and distribute content to U.S. audiences with hidden Russian government messaging," by contracting online influencers with big audiences. They have since been charged with conspiracy to commit money laundering and conspiracy to violate the Foreign Agents Registration Act. Though the company is not named in the indictment, it is described as "a network of heterodox commentators that focus on Western political and cultural issues" - which is also how Tenet is known to describe itself.

For now, the named content creators - Matt Christiansen, Tayler Hansen, Benny Johnson, Tim Pool, Dave Rubin and Lauren Southern (who traveled to Russia in 2018 to meet with and make content with neo-fascist philosopher and Putin ally, Alexander Dugin) - all say they didn't know their efforts were being paid for by Russian operatives. They describe themselves as the "victims" of the Russian scheme. But the evidence continues to stack up. CNN reports the creators were specifically recruited for their right-wing leaning content, as the RT employees hoped to "plug in to the commentators' vast network of fans to exploit divisive narratives that achieved the Kremlin's goals."


Jessica Scott-Reid wrote this article for Sentient.


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By Jessica Kutz for The 19th.
Broadcast version by Alex Gonzalez for Arizona News Connection, reporting for the Solutions Journalism Network-Public News Service Collaboration

Hazel Chandler was at home taking care of her son when she began flipping through a document that detailed how burning fossil fuels would soon jeopardize the planet.

She can't quite remember who gave her the report - this was in 1969 - but the moment stands out to her vividly: After reading a list of extreme climate events that would materialize in the coming decades, she looked down at the baby she was nursing, filled with dread.

"'Oh my God, I've got to do something,'" she remembered thinking.

It was one of several such moments throughout Chandler's life that propelled her into activist spaces - against the Vietnam War, for civil rights and women's rights, and in support of other environmental causes.

She participated in letter-writing campaigns and helped gather others to write to legislators about vital pieces of environmental legislation including the Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act, passed in 1970 and 1972, respectively. At the child care center she worked at, she helped plan celebrations around the first Earth Day in 1970.

Now at 78, after working in child care and health care for most of her life, she's more engaged than ever. In 2015, she began volunteering with Elder Climate Action, which focuses on activating older people to fight for the environment. She then took a job as a consultant for the Union for Concerned Scientists, a nonprofit science advocacy organization.

More recently, her activism has revolved around her role as the Arizona field coordinator of Moms Clean Air Force, a nonprofit environmental advocacy group. Chandler helps rally volunteers to take action on climate and environmental justice issues, recruiting residents to testify and meet with lawmakers.

Her motivation now is the same as it was decades ago.

"When I look my grandchildren and my great-grandchildren, my children, in the eye, I have to be able to say, 'I did everything I could to protect you,'" Chandler said. "I have to be able to tell them that I've done everything possible within my ability to help move us forward."

Chandler is part of a largely unrecognized contingent of the climate movement in the United States: the climate grannies.

The most prominent example perhaps, is the actor Jane Fonda. The octogenarian grandmother has been arrested during climate protests a number of times and has her own PAC that funds the campaigns of "climate champions" in local and state elections.

Climate grannies come equipped with decades of activism experience and aim to pressure the government and corporations to curb fossil fuel emissions. As a result they, alongside women of every age group, are turning out in bigger numbers, both at protests and the polls. All of the climate grandmothers The 19th interviewed for this piece noted one unifying theme: concern for their grandchildren's futures.

According to research conducted by Dana R. Fisher, director for the Center of Environment, Community and Equity at American University, while the mainstream environmental movement has typically been dominated by men, women make up 61 percent of climate activists today. The average age of climate activists was 52 with 24 percent being 69 and older.

Part of the gender shift, she says, can be traced back to the mass demonstrations and protests that flourished in response to former President Donald Trump.

"Starting with the Women's March and the day after the inauguration of Donald Trump ... women are more engaged and women are more likely to be leaders," Fisher said.

"Which is nice, because especially in the environmental arena it has historically been quite the dude fest."

A similar trend holds true at the ballot box, according to data collected by the Environmental Voter Project, a nonpartisan organization focused on turning out climate voters in elections.

A report released by the Environmental Voter Project in December that looked at the patterns of registered voters in 18 different states found that after the Gen Z vote, people 65 and older represent the next largest climate voter group, with older women far exceeding older men in their propensity to list climate as their No. 1 reason for voting. The organization defines climate voters as those who are most likely to list climate change, the environment, or clean air and water as their top political priority.

"Grandmothers are now at the vanguard of today's climate movement," said Nathaniel Stinnett, founder of the Environmental Voter Project.

"Older people are three times as likely to list climate as a top priority than middle-aged people. On top of that, women in all age groups are more likely to care about climate than men," he said. "So you put those two things together ... and you can safely say that grandma is much more likely to be a climate voter than your middle-aged man."

In Arizona, where Chandler lives, older climate voters make up 231,000 registered voters in the state. The presidential election in the crucial swing state was decided by just 11,000 votes, Stinnett noted.

"Older climate voters can really throw their weight around in Arizona if they organize and if they make sure that everybody goes to the polls," he said.

In some cases, their identities as grandmothers have become an organizing force.

In California, 1000 Grandmothers for Future Generations formed in 2016, after older women from the Bay Area traveled to be in solidarity with Indigenous grandmothers protesting the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline at the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation.

"When they came back, they decided to form an organization that would continue to mobilize women on behalf of the climate justice movement," said Nancy Hollander, a member of the group.

1000 Grandmothers - in this case, the term encompasses all older women, not just the literal grandmothers - is rooted at the intersection of social justice and the climate crisis, supporting people of color and Indigenous-led causes in the Bay Area. The organization is divided into various working groups, each with a different focus: elections, bank divestments from fossil fuels, legislative work, nonviolent direct actions, among others.

They make frequent appearances alongside other climate activist groups at protests in front of banks like Wells Fargo, which finances oil and gas infrastructure, as well as participating in the annual Anti-Chevron day, protesting at the Chevron Refinery in Richmond, California.

For Hollander, 85, the work has been energizing, a continuation of the political activism she was a part of throughout her life. It's also helped her mentally cope with the multiple crises the world is currently experiencing.

"It facilitates a sense of agency and of me being in concert with my values and my ideals. It also puts me in touch with other people, other human beings, who are motivated by similar desires and commitments," she said.

Many of the activists emphasized how important that sense of community is, especially when the work can lead one into a sense of despair over all that has been lost. Action, they agree, is an antidote, a way to cope with that feeling and show their care. Much of their work centers on protecting the younger generation - from the threats of the climate crisis, but also in activist spaces.

"There are women in the nonviolent direct action part of the organization who really do feel that elder women - it's their time to stand up and be counted and to get arrested," Hollander said. "They consider it a historical responsibility and put themselves out there to protect the more vulnerable."

But 1000 Grandmothers credits another grandmother activist, Pennie Opal Plant, for helping train their members in nonviolent direct action and for inspiring them to take the lead of Indigenous women in the fight.

Plant, 66 - an enrolled member of the Yaqui of Southern California tribe, and of undocumented Choctaw and Cherokee ancestry - has started various organizations over the years, including Idle No More SF Bay, which she co-founded with a group of Indigenous grandmothers in 2013, first in solidarity with a group formed by First Nations women in Canada to defend treaty rights and to protect the environment from exploitation.

In 2016, Plant gathered with others in front of Wells Fargo Corporate offices in San Francisco, blocking the road in protest of the Dakota Access Pipeline, when she realized the advantages she had as an older woman in the fight.

As a police liaison - or a person who aims to defuse tension with law enforcement - she went to speak to an officer who was trying to interrupt the action. When she saw him maneuvering his car over a sidewalk, she stood in front of it, her gray hair flowing. "I opened my arms really wide and was like, are you going to run over a grandmother?"

A new idea was born: The Society of Fearless Grandmothers. Once an in-person training - it now mostly exists online as a Facebook page - it helped teach other grandmothers how to protect the youth at protests.

For Plant, the role of grandmothers in the fight to protect the planet is about a simple Indigenous principle: ensuring the future for the next seven generations.

"What we're seeing is a shift starting with Indigenous women, that is lifting up the good things that mothers have to share, the good things that women that love children can share, that will help bring back balance in the world," Plant said.

The coordination between the two groups is one instance of intersectional work happening in the climate activism space. Though younger climate activists tend to be part of a more diverse movement, Fisher notes the movement is still predominantly White.

"People of color are mobilizing, but in many cases, they're not mobilizing and engaging in activism that is specifically focused on climate," Fisher said. "They may be engaging in work that is more climate justice, frontline community focused or against systemic racism, but it's framed really differently than in most of the groups that are doing this kind of climate work ... so there's still a very big gulf there that needs to be crossed."

Some of the older generation of activists see working on issues surrounding the climate as a way to try and correct some of their generation's historical wrongs.

Kathleen Sullivan, an organizer with Third Act - a national organization started by environmentalist Bill McKibben - said that's part of what has motivated her to become a climate activist in her later years.

"I couldn't live with myself if I didn't because I've been gifted with so much in life, and those gifts have come at a huge price," she said, reflecting on how resource extraction, slavery, genocide, have built this country and led to the climate crisis. "And, when you wake up to that, first you weep and and then you say, 'Oh my God, there's a whole other way to live a life, another way to understand how to be on this planet.'"

Sullivan is one of approximately 70,000 people over the age of 60 who've joined Third Act, a group specifically formed to engage people 60 and older to mobilize for climate action across the country.

"This is an act of moral responsibility. It's an act of care. And It's an act of reciprocity to the way in which we are cared for by the planet," Sullivan said. "It's an act of interconnection to your peers, because there can be great joy and great sense of solidarity with other people around this."


Jessica Kutz wrote this article for Inside Climate News.


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