20 Questions about Climate Change
What is Montana doing to contribute to climate change?
In the recent Held v. Montana case, sixteen plaintiffs sued Montana because of the state’s reluctance to uphold our constitutional guarantee to a clean and healthy environment. Throughout the trial, various expert witnesses collectively presented a picture of the significant impact Montana’s fossil fuel policy has on global greenhouse gas emissions.
To understand our contribution to emissions globally, Peter Erickson, a climate change policy researcher with the Stockholm Environmental Institute in Seattle, offered testimony. According to Erickson, we rank sixth in the United States - on a per capita basis - for carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions1. This is due to our abundance of fossil fuels, the majority of which are exported. Erickson stated that Montana "is the lynchpin of the fossil fuels economy within the North American region2."
To arrive at cumulative amounts of CO2 emissions, Erickson analyzed extraction, transportation, processing and consumption of coal, oil and gas. He then translated that data into a CO2-equivalent figure to help standardize the measurements, since each emission type affects our atmosphere differently.
His numbers from 2019 - the latest date all data was available – show that we extracted 70 million tons of fossil fuels, transported and processed 80 million tons and consumed 32 million tons. Our emissions amounted to 166 million tons of CO2 in 2019.
It can be difficult to understand the severity of these emissions if we look at Montana’s data alone. A comparison shared from Erickson will help: Our state population is 1.1 million. However, we emit the same amount as Argentina (47 million), the Netherlands (18 million) and Pakistan (248 million).
The total is high due in part to our active coal mines. Not only does coal burning support nearly half of our state’s energy production (42% in 2022), we also ship much of our coal out of state and overseas3.
Montana is also home to over 5000 oil and 6000 gas wells4. In the last fifteen years, there was an increase in permits - for both well types – due to fracking.
To explain how Montana legislation impacts these permits, the co-director of the Montana Environmental Information Center (MEIC), Anne Hedges, testified at the trial. Hedges shared that permits for fossil fuels are regulated by the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ), through the Montana Environmental Policy Act (MEPA) established in 1970. The original design of MEPA was to have agencies analyze the environmental impacts of permits and consider alternatives. In 2011 the legislature limited MEPA, shifting its scope to focus on impacts within Montana alone, and not on a regional, national or global scale5.
At the trial, the Department of Environmental Quality mirrored Hedge’s assessment. Chris Dorrington, the director; and Sonja Nowakowski, the air, energy and mining division administrator, both explained that the agency cannot deny, given an application in compliance with the law, any fossil fuels permit based on greenhouse gas emissions or consideration of climate change impact6.
We are a big state with a smaller population and abundant energy potential. Our natural reserves of fossil fuels are notable and our capacity for renewable energy is also tremendous. Our legislative decisions, in terms of climate change, impact Montana as well as the world.
In forthcoming articles, we’ll cover more details about the trial plus Montana’s recently released Pollution Reduction Plan.
Twenty Questions is a series by Heidi Harting-Rex, a Choteau resident and avid climate change reader, and Rosie Ferguson, a graduate of the University of Montana Journalism School with a minor in Climate Change Studies. They both are active in the Bob Marshall Wilderness Area.
All images copyright John Moore.