We’re a Climate Haven

The two stories were in direct conflict.

On the evening news we watch the raging wildfires destroying entire neighborhoods around Los Angeles. And here in Wisconsin we read that the state projects that our population will decline by about 200,000 residents by 2050.

The problem with the second story is that it doesn’t take into account the first.

The Department of Administration’s projections are based on the usual stuff — mostly an aging population and declining fertility rates. It didn’t take into account the impacts of climate change.

Wisconsin and the entire Upper Great Lakes Region are something of a climate haven. It’s not that we’ll escape the impacts of climate change — ask resort and restaurant owners in my neighborhood up in the U.P. who are enduring a second straight year without snow — but it looks like we’ll dodge the worst of it. We may have some extended droughts and more wildfire potential, but nothing like what’s been going on in the West. We may have some heavier rain events, but nothing like the Hurricanes hammering the East Coast and Gulf. We may have more tornadoes but not like those ripping through the South.

Moreover, we have plenty of fresh water, a big constraint on growth in the West. If the DOA had been able to take all that into account I think the projection on our population would be reversed at the very least. It’s impossible to say exactly what that number will look like, but I think it’s far more likely to be at least 200,000 more residents, not that many less.

The question for us may soon become how much of that growth to encourage and how to manage it. It’s better to be a growing region than a contracting one. But growth brings its own challenges for housing costs, transportation congestion, cultural adjustments and more.

Meanwhile, California and other coastal states, as well as the Federal government, are going to have to decide what their policies will be in terms of rebuilding and allowing new construction in dangerous areas. Some of that is already being decided by the private sector as insurance companies start to back out of disaster prone places.

The insurance companies’ moves should be supported, not fought. Every insurance payer, even those here, shares in the cost when people rebuild in disaster prone places. Of course, it’s brutal to ask someone to leave their home and move elsewhere. But we can’t subsidize bad choices. Climate change has made the costs too massive. And there’s a basic question of fairness as well. The coasts are, overall, far more wealthy and powerful than the Midwest and yet it would be Midwesterners, through their insurance premiums and their tax dollars, who would be subsidizing the coasts.

Along these lines, I think it was a mistake for Pres. Joe Biden to pledge that the Federal government will pick up 100% of the fire fighting costs in Los Angeles for the next 180 days. That was even more than the 90% Gov. Gavin Newsom had requested. I understand that there are a lot of Democratic voters in L.A., but this is just bad public policy.

Certainly, a Federal disaster relief commitment is absolutely necessary. But we shouldn’t go beyond reasonable limits. Nothing will change if state officials don’t get the message that this isn’t sustainable and they may not get that message or get it quickly enough if the Feds bail them out.

Climate change will cost us trillions of dollars and many human lives. It should have been avoided or at least mitigated long ago. But the climate deniers have brought us to this. Now the question is not about how to stop its effects but how to manage them. It’s likely that, over time, more and more people and companies will take climate into account as they decide where to be. And a lot of them will decide to come right here. We need to start thinking about that.