Last week, my family’s ranch — which we have owned for five generations — and the home my grandfather built were utterly destroyed in a wildfire that claimed two other homes and more than 15,000 acres of rangeland. Fueled by climate-change-induced drought, heat and wind, the blaze spread fast and hot. It was just like the fires in California you see on the news, but in the unlikely setting of Nebraska cattle country.
I’m a volunteer firefighter in the tiny 150-person town of Bluff, Utah, so I know enough about wildfire to be sure there was nothing that could have saved the ranch. Growing up, we never even worried about these kinds of blazes. But today, the vegetation is drier, the weather is hotter and these disasters are an increasingly frequent reality.
My family’s story is a brutal example of why rural America has to prepare for more extreme weather and be a part of our collective response to climate change. The good news is that help is coming in the form of major legislation currently pending in Congress, the Inflation Reduction Act. The bill could be a real economic winner for rural communities, but only if it’s passed and only if it’s implemented with engagement from fly-over country.
First off, the bill would invest $20 billion in family farmers and ranchers, the backbone of our rural economies. This will create opportunities to improve soil health, increase crop yields, reduce fertilizer costs, increase resilience to extreme weather and diversify income streams. These agricultural practices can improve farmers’ bottom line and are good for air and water quality, too.
Second, there are major cost savings for rural America through $10 billion in funding for electric cooperatives to invest in cheap, renewable energy. This will make it possible for coops — which supply electricity to 42 million people, including 92 percent of persistent poverty counties — to follow the path taken by Kit Carson Electric Cooperative in rural New Mexico.
With many energy suppliers jacking up costs, Kit Carson announced in July it would be cutting customers’ energy bills by as much as 25 percent. How? Starting this summer, 100 percent of the co-op’s daytime energy will come directly from the sun, thanks to their foresight in building solar generation in their community. The Inflation Reduction Act will make it much easier for other co-ops to do the same and return money to their customers’ bank accounts.
Beyond these investments, the bill would provide tools for rural families and small businesses to reduce energy and transportation costs. The average homeowner could save $1,800 each year by taking advantage of the bill’s incentives for efficiency upgrades, electric vehicles and solar. There’s also $40 billion for U.S. manufacturing of solar panels, wind turbines, batteries and critical minerals, bringing home good-paying jobs to help rural communities that have suffered from outsourcing.
Finally, back to wildfire. Anyone who has lost a farm, ranch or home knows the economic and emotional impact. Insurance just can’t cover the real costs for homeowners or our broader economy. The bill would invest $5 billion in sustainable forestry to help prevent others from suffering my family’s fate. But we know the risks of wildfire as well as crop-killing droughts and floods — and they will continue to get worse as the planet heats up.
Ultimately, rural communities can be a roadblock to climate progress or a crucial team player advancing our mutual success. The Inflation Reduction Act is a huge step for empowering rural climate leaders and advancing our national climate goals, reducing greenhouse gas emissions by up to 44 percent. All this without increasing taxes for hard-working Americans, family farmers or small businesses. Instead, it stops corporations from using loopholes to avoid paying their fair share.
There’s a lot else about the bill worth supporting. It reduces our federal deficit, fights inflation by reducing energy and health care costs, as well as helping millions of Americans save money on prescription drugs. But my mind is on my family’s ranch and how I don’t want anyone else to go through what we did this past week.
The potential for these investments to transform our trajectory on climate change depends on whether or not rural folks are supported in accessing and implementing the opportunities this bill offers. This is a real issue, as decades of disinvestment have left rural areas with little capacity to navigate federal funding processes and programs.
Our representatives in government and the philanthropic community must ensure rural communities are central to our collective solutions for climate change. The fire and its impacts have spread to our communities, and the road to climate progress runs straight through rural America.
Josh Ewing is the director of the Rural Climate Partnership, which seeks to energize rural-led solutions on climate. He’s also a volunteer firefighter and EMT, based in the tiny town of Bluff, Utah.