Climate Change - Let's Talk About It
Montana’s Constitution declares that its citizens have certain inalienable rights (Article II, Section3). One of these is: “the right to a clean and healthful environment"
The U.S. Constitution preamble makes government actions a high priority to ‘…Promote the general Welfare…”.
Legislators and elected officials have a mandatory responsibility to consider the actual greatest good for the greatest number in their actions and their policies in order to “promote the general welfare.”
Realistic options to combat climate change are readily available through clean energy development, energy efficient infrastructure, and new technology that can arrest the climate change trend.
Legislators and elected officials need to look at all the options for preventing a worsening of the climate change trend without pre-existing bias or uninformed opinions.
The Ravalli Democratic Committee supports Climate Change Solutions
We believe in climate change solutions such as:
- Programs to train or retrain Montana workers for the growing market in clean energy jobs.
- Incentives for Montana’s entrepreneurs, businesses, universities, and government agencies to develop reliable, realistic, and affordable clean energy sources that will attract skilled higher wage jobs.
- Programs investing in wage, job, and retirement security for workers dislocated from fossil fuel jobs as a result of clean energy development.
- Adopt an official state policy emphasizing clean energy production for Montana.
- End the 18 month tax holiday for new wells that has given oil and gas companies excessive profits and deprived Montana communities of tens of millions of dollars in revenue for water systems, public sewers, education and roads. Fossil fuel wells produce the highest profits for companies within the first 18 months of operation.
- Reduce the mandatory dependence on petroleum products that drive up the costs for Montana’s working families and businesses in our long-driving distance, cold climate conditions.
— for additional information, see: “National Science Foundation: Ice Core Facility” or search for "Climate Change" on UN,org”
Montana Republicans Repeatedly Oppose Effective Measures to Reduce Climate Change Impacts on Montanans
House Representative Ryan Zinke, a board member of an oil pipeline company, along with influential Republican state legislators and Governor Gianforte routinely double down on record by pushing only fossil fuel development projects.
In 2023 , MT Republicans passed bills that prohibit local governments from adopting clean energy policies. This shows how many MT Republican legislators support local control only when it agrees with their Party platform.
In 2023, Republican legislators passed and Greg Gianforte signed SB557 which attempted to forbid state agencies from considering greenhouse gas emissions in environmental reviews. The MT Supreme Court ruled that the law violated the MT Constitution.
The MT Republican Party Platform deliberately and publicly ignores the well-documented basic science of greenhouse gas emissions causing the current climate change crisis.
The MT Republican Party Platform on record opposes grants by MT DEQ to accelerate clean energy opportunities and production.
In 2023, Republican legislators passed and Greg Gianforte signed HB 170 which further promotes fossil fuel dependency.
All MT Republican in the U.S. House and Senate voted against of the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act which provides clean energy funds and tax credits and cuts costs of climate change by $1.9 trillion over the next 20 years. Yet these same Republicans publicly take credit for recent investments and benfits provided by the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act.
Climate Change Needs to be Recognized and Realistic Effective Actions Need to Occur Immediately
Mainstream science overwhelmingly confirms that the trend of climate change has accelerated.
— for additional information, see: “National Science Foundation: Ice Core Facility” or search for "Climate Change" on UN,org”
Scientists have sounded the alarm bell for decades now about the impending disastrous consequences of this trend.
Greenhouse gases introduce more energy into the global climate system that now results in the increasingly frequent and intense catastrophic events of hurricanes, floods, droughts, wildfires, crop failures, marine life and fisheries impacts, tornados and intolerable heat waves.
Our World in Data, a well-respected non-partisan scientific data collection organization, published a 2024 survey that showed 77% of the U.S. population believe that climate change is a serious threat to humanity. Numerous other reliable unbiased surveys have produced similar survey results.
Lack of action and failure to pursue solutions will further harm our health, disrupt our economies and leave a damaged world for our children.
