I’ve officially dubbed summer 2024 Underpants Summer. I’m hot, you’re hot, and my kids are hot. During the extreme heat wave, my kids resorted to wearing only underwear. It’s too hot to wear anything else. For many reasons, including having to be out in public to purchase groceries or go to the bank, I refrain from their summer uniform. However, I’m no less enthusiastic about their practical style choice. It’s tough to stay cool in a warming world. Stripping down to your underpants only does so much and it’s beyond time that U.S. politicians take the threat of climate change seriously.
Extreme heat events, like the one we’ve experienced for the past few weeks, are occurring around the globe and it’s reported that in June more than 5 billion people suffered from these unprecedented temperatures. Places like Las Vegas continued to bake into July, with weeklong temperatures at 115 degrees. That’s the same temp I set on my oven when I want to cure my leather gloves with weather-proof wax come ski season. Of course, I’m not only worried about cooling down my fevered kiddos after they’ve played outside but I’m also concerned that there won’t be a ski season in a few years.
In a state like Montana which is politically, economically, and culturally driven by its abundance of natural resources, it’s a despicable failure that many elected leaders either deny climate change or downplay its existential threat. How long can communities like the Flathead Valley survive if the snow no longer falls and the chairlifts can run? What happens to the summer tourism industry after too many months of smoke-filled skies and the air is unsafe to breathe? It’s not hyperbole to imagine Whitefish or Columbia Falls or even Kalispell succumbing to dangerous wildfires like what’s occurred to Jasper in Alberta. As I write this, it’s too soon to know the breadth of the destruction, but the entire town of 25,000 had to be evacuated and it’s too soon to know if any buildings still stand.
But there is some hope across the border and, while Governor Greg Gianforte isn’t very forthcoming about climate change policies, Montana is expected to receive a $50 million federal grant from the EPA to reduce greenhouse gas emissions associated with forestry and agricultural industries. The grant is part of a nationwide federal funding project to support community-driven solutions to climate change and in a news story about the grant, the governor expressed his gratitude for the investment to tackle greenhouse emissions with projects such as planting 2.5 million trees, funding canopy coverage for 70 Montana communities, and improving water quality from agricultural runoff. Our state is also expected to deliver a climate action plan in 2025, and it couldn’t come a moment too soon.
Montana also has an opportunity to invest in many of its innovative alternative energy opportunities and tap into the technology and progressive services that made both the governor and Senator Steve Daines their fortunes. Confronting climate change and catastrophic weather events will take a massive governmental effort but our country has demonstrated in the past like when we put a man on the moon, that we’re capable of rising to a challenge.
I want to believe that Underpants Summer doesn’t become a year-round wardrobe necessity.
Maggie Doherty is a writer and book reviewer who lives in Kalispell with her family.