The Colorado Agriculture & Food Federation is proud to be a partner with the winning team of the National Clean Energy Award – the only team from Colorado to receive the award. The SOLVE IT award will help launch an innovative project to clean up a former coal mine in Delta County, eradicate climate-damaging methane pollution, and create jobs. Sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy, the award was made possible through climate funding from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Act.
With a well-functioning government, remote mountain communities with a population of just a few thousand can be fertile ground for innovation and the environment, but when tackling climate change becomes a political issue, rural Colorado suffers.
Remote and rural spaces are already under-resourced. Inadequate transport networks make them even more vulnerable as the impacts of climate change grow. As heatstroke increases and vector-borne diseases such as West Nile spread rapidly over large areas, both rural residents and visitors, who are often outdoors and have poorer health services, are at higher risk.
Fortunately, progress was made on climate funding in the last Congress, including through infrastructure and inflation control legislation. Now that money is reaching areas like the North Fork Valley. But even the first steps could be jeopardized if backward-thinking politicians reverse the progress made so far. With the political season upon us and heated rhetoric favored over finding solutions, the risk is real. Climate realists in Congress must defend the gains made through unfounded deregulation and attacks.
The value of these projects should not be underestimated. The Inflation Control and Infrastructure Acts have spurred new and innovative developments in clean energy and other climate solutions. Recently, climate tech outlet Latitude Media wrote that investment banks are valuing the certainty these landmark laws provide, and that “the regulatory clarity provided by the IRA has given investors and developers the opportunity to innovate over a longer time horizon than ever before.”
Investors aren’t the only ones who respond to certainty. Certainty allows communities to better plan projects and businesses to evolve with a changing economy and needs. Western Colorado has already benefited greatly from climate change funding enacted in the last Legislature. This includes water projects to increase efficiency and drought resilience, funding for clean energy and transportation, and new programs to build the environmental workforce.
Looking back at history, Western Colorado stands to rely on projects funded by wise federal investments made more than 100 years ago, including projects built by the first Civilian Conservation Corps, established by President Franklin Roosevelt in 1933, and large projects like the Gunnison Tunnel, which opened the Uncompahgre Valley to irrigated agriculture in 1909. Investments made today can similarly have lasting benefits for decades to come.
Additionally, ensuring adequate funding reaches rural areas is inherently fair. The North Fork has a population of just 9,000, but is home to Colorado’s most productive coal mine. Pollution from 120 years of mining is real, and the methane gas released into the atmosphere is a climate risk and a threat to public health. A recent article in the Daily Yonder, which covers rural issues, noted that many rural greenhouse gases are produced and emitted to power the way urban and suburban Americans live.
Politicians talk about how much they care about “leapfrog communities.” But as we approach the end of this Congress, make no mistake: cutting climate and environmental funding will hurt rural areas, not empower them. Cutting funding will leave rural America under-resourced, making it even harder for people to come up with the solutions that best suit their communities.
The Colorado Agriculture & Food Federation is working diligently to help the coal mining project in Delta County succeed. But the limitations on what can be done in the area of rural climate action are not due to a lack of need, creativity or capacity. The limitations are primarily placed on us, intentionally or by neglect, by those who stomp on economic fears and obstruct action for personal or partisan gain.
Current federal climate funding should be maintained and more funds should be made available to communities, including rural Colorado. Congress should not cut funding and should continue to support projects, solutions and practices that are innovative, beneficial and effective.
Important steps were taken in the last Congress, but the current Congress has not followed through. But that may not be the worst yet.
The progress already made is crucial. This progress must be protected, but it’s only the beginning. The Colorado Agriculture-Food Alliance urges elected leaders to heed this call, secure climate action funding in the IRA and infrastructure legislation, and expand, not shrink, these opportunities for all American communities.
Pete Kolbenschlag lives in Delta County, is a director for the Colorado Agri-Food Alliance and a longtime rural advocate and climate activist.
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