The Montana Climate Action Project is a collaboration of partners in Montana working to find solutions, create opportunities and empower people around the issue of climate change. Our goal is to provide Montana citizens with the information and tools they need to understand climate change and make personal changes that will have a positive effect on the climate change crisis.
News
U.S. States, Canadian Provinces Announce Regional Cap-and-Trade Program
to Reduce Greenhouse Gases - First comprehensive approach to achieving emissions reductions will bring environmental and economic benefits
Western Climate Initiative, 9/23/08
The Western Climate Initiative (WCI) today announced recommendations for the design of a regional market-based cap-and-trade program. The program will slash climate-changing greenhouse gas emissions, spur growth in new green technologies, help build a strong clean-energy economy and reduce dependence on foreign oil.
The cap-and-trade design is an important element of a comprehensive regional effort by the governors and premiers of seven U.S. states and four Canadian provinces to promote environmental sustainability and economic growth by reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 15 percent below 2005 levels by 2020.
New Report: Thousands of News Jobs for Montana from Clean Energy
Montana stands to gain 6,335 jobs by investing in global-warming solutions
As America confronts the current energy crisis, a new report by economists from the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) at the University of Massachusetts- Amherst shows that the U.S. can create two million jobs nationwide by investing in clean energy technologies that will strengthen the economy and fight global warming. The report finds that investing in clean energy would create four times as many jobs
as spending the same amount of money within the oil industry.
"Green Recovery - A Program to Create Good Jobs and Start Building a Low- Carbon Economy" analyzes the potential for a two-year $100 billion green investment program - which would be comparable to the size of the April 2008 federal stimulus package dedicated to consumer rebates - to be an engine for job creation in Montana and nationwide. In Montana, 6,335 jobs would be created by investing in this clean energy program.
Read the national report: www.peri.umass.edu/green_recovery
Read the Montana report: www.peri.umass.edu/fileadmin/pdf/other_publication_types/green_economics/montan
a.pdf
In Montana, coal's future enters governor's race
By Matthew Brown, Associated Press, 9/19/08
HELENA, Mont. (AP) — Republican Roy Brown has promised a more aggressive energy policy for Montana if elected governor — with expanded coal mining, a new power plant and fewer barriers to oil and gas exploration.
Brown, a state senator from Billings, said this week that placing a large tract of state-owned coal in southeastern Montana up for bid would be among his first actions as governor.
Coalition campaign will tell the region to step it up - Efficiency Works!
NW Energy Coalition, 9/15/08
The NW Energy Coalition has secured major new foundation funding to launch an ambitious, region-wide energy efficiency campaign. The Efficiency Works! campaign is aimed at both civic and business leaders to demonstrate that energy efficiency is the easiest, quickest and cheapest strategy for meeting regional energy needs and for cutting greenhouse gas emissions. The campaign will also highlight other significant benefits increased energy efficiency delivers: consumer savings, more comfortable homes and businesses, reduced vulnerability to volatile energy markets and new good paying, local green jobs.
The Coalition hired Senior Policy Associate Kim Drury in July to spearhead the Coalition's efficiency initiative and will hire three new staff for the campaign, one each in Seattle, Idaho and Montana. The campaign's first priority is to produce a pair of research projects critical to the Efficiency Works! campaign: an overview of regional energy-efficiency potential (both electric and natural gas) and a report on barriers - and solutions - to realizing that potential. For more information, contact Kim Drury at kim@nwenergy.org.
Hot Springs man sees energy in all that water
By Michael Jamison, Missoulian, 9/7/08
HOT SPRINGS - Paul Stelter thinks in circles. Round and round, no beginning and no end, volcanic ideas fueled by the heat of the earth itself. His eyes get wide when he thinks, and his voice louder when the ideas finally start to erupt.
His latest circle of thought looks something like this: Dump a bunch of garden waste into a bio-gas digester, warm it up with geothermal water (which percolates everywhere in his tiny town of Hot Springs), create compost out one end and methane gas out the other. Use the compost to feed the greenhouse, and the greenhouse to feed the people as well as the digester, starting the cycle all over.
The methane, he imagines, will be bled off as fuel for making heat and electricity.
Economist on a mission
By Eve Byron, Helena Independent Record, 9/04/08
The chief economist for the American Petroleum Institute is trying to change people’s perception of the industry. John Felmy said a recent industry survey of 1,500 people showed that some public impressions aren’t correct — such as where our country’s oil comes from — so the institute is embarking on an educational program.
“We learned after (hurricanes) Katrina and Rita that people don’t know much about the oil industry,” Felmy told the Independent Record’s editorial board on Wednesday. “We as an industry have done a bad job in the last 150 years in educating people, and we are an important part of their lives."
Groups critical of draft climate-change recommendations
By John S. Adams, Great Falls Tribune, 8/22/08
HELENA — Thirteen of the state's top conservation and environmental groups believe the legislative Environmental Quality Council's 11 draft recommendations on climate change don't go far enough to address the problem.
In a letter sent to the council Thursday, the groups said the EQC's recommendations ignore the most urgent of the 54 recommendations made by the Governor's Climate Change Advisory Committee. "While we support almost any meaningful approach to reducing greenhouse gases in Montana ... we are profoundly disappointed by the limited number and scope of solutions proposed by the EQC," the letter states.
Brita Climate Ride Touts the Bicycle as Agent of Change
By Bill Schneider, New West News, 8/20/08
Caeli Quinn of Whitefish and Geraldine Carter of Missoula co-founded the Brita Climate Ride 2008, a five-day event starting September 20 in New York City and ending in Washington D.C. on the steps of the Capital Building. Each rider has to raise or contribute $2,250 to be one of the 120 cyclists riding a scenic route to the Capital with the proceeds going to Clean Air - Cool Planet and Focus the Nation, two nonprofits leading the way in climate change education, renewable energy policies, and global warming solutions.
This is the first year for the Brita Climate Ride 2008, which will become an annual event, and already it has become the equivalent of a global climate change conference on two wheels.
Glacier Park: The next century - Disappearing namesake may make pristine wilderness symbol of climate change
By Michael Jamison, Missoulian, 8/19/08
WEST GLACIER - The tourists huddled in a shivering pack amid what should have been the heat of July, crowding around Laura Kloeck while she explained a bit about climate change. “There is definitely a frightening side to global warming,” Kloeck told them, “but there is hope, too.”
Hope hip-deep, white and wintry and piled high in mid-July atop Glacier National Park's popular Logan Pass. Here, where trails remained buried beneath snowpack well into summer's season, Kloeck talked on about a warming world. Her hat was flat - as park rangers' are - but her delivery was sharp and pointed. The lingering snowfield you see here, she explained, is weather, not climate, and weather is unpredictable. Weather is what pushed temperatures just east of here 100 degrees - from 44 above to 56 below - in less than 24 hours back on Jan. 23, 1916. Weather is wild.
Climate, on the other hand, can be tracked over time, can be measured and modeled, even predicted. The trend lines, Kloeck told her chilly crowd, are clear. The world is warming.
Act Now!
Climate change and you. What you can do now! From the Montana Department of Environmental Quality:
10 Initial Steps to Save Energy
- Take inventory of energy use in the home. Most utilities offer methods to calculate energy usage in the home. Northwestern Energy offers a calculator that can be used by any homeowner. Also, try the carbon footprint calculators.
- Order an energy audit. Most utilities offer energy audits for residential customers. Visit the following sites for more information, and don’t forget to follow the recommendations:
* Northwestern Energy
* Montana Dakota Utilities
* Flathead Electric
* Bonneville Power Administration - Change out light bulbs at every opportunity with energy efficient bulbs, such as compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) and light emitting diode (LED) units as appropriate. These types of lights use one-third to one-half the energy of conventional bulbs.
- Install programmable set-back thermostats to better govern space heating use. Space heating is the biggest energy user for most homes. Set-back thermostats are programmed to not call for heat while the occupants are sleeping or are away at work or school.
- Weather-seal doors and operable windows, and look for places to caulk and seal around window and door frames. These are avenues of direct energy loss. Caulking and sealing has the earliest return and improves comfort.
- Take a good look at windows and plan for energy saving replacements as necessary. Energy Star ratings for windows (PDF 932 KB) are available. A south-facing double-paned window is a net heat gainer at our latitude in most areas of Montana. Windows facing other aspects lose heat, however. Consider operable window treatments that conserve heat loss at night.
- Take a close look at the hot water heater. Whether electric, natural gas, or propane, the water heater uses energy. Many units can be insulated to boost efficiency. Energy Star ratings are not currently available for new water heater units. But read labels carefully and select an appropriate size. Low-flow shower heads are an easy way to conserve.
- Think about a new refrigerator. Refrigerators are a great energy saving success story. New Energy Star rated units are surprisingly affordable and use way less energy than models more than 10 years old. The same goes for freezers. Got an old refrigerator in the garage? Recycle it. The energy it uses far outweighs any convenience.
- Drive less. Drive slower. Keep the car timed, tuned, and the tire pressure up. Think long and hard before purchasing a replacement automobile. A high-mileage conventional car is often the best solution.
- Watch out for those winter-time extras. Headbolt-style engine heaters for cars can really burn the juice. Put them on a simple timer. An hour-and-a-half is usually plenty for most engines. Stock tank heaters can run up energy use as well. If possible, earth berm the tank or insulate it, including a partial lid. You may be able to use a smaller heater on a timer. Outdoor hot tubs, too, use plenty of energy, especially during winter use. The integrity and amount of insulation is important as is the stand-by temperature.
