New Column: Blame Canada While Ignoring the Climate Gorilla

A number of politicians in the Upper Midwest made headlines during last week’s Air Quality alerts by sending complaints to Canadian officials and the US Ambassador to Canada demanding better control of wildfires, which were creating a pall, for the third summer now, over the upper Great Lakes during a time when many of us seek the outdoors as a getaway.
I took them to task in this month’s column.

Peter Sinclair in Midland Daily News:

It’s been said every disaster movie begins with someone ignoring a scientist.
Nothing could be more true of this summer’s pall of choking wildfire smoke enveloping Michigan and the midwest – a well studied effect of human caused climate change.

In a recent camping trip, I saw this emerging climate impact first hand while hiking on a remote Lake Michigan beach, where the Air Quality Index was more like Baghdad or Jakarta than Pure Michigan.

If you’re quick, you can still read NASA’s assessment of climate and wildfires (before this anti-science administration takes it down).

According to NASA, “Earth’s warming climate is amplifying wild land fire activity, particularly in northern and temperate forests,” citing recent research from several international teams.
The key assessment was that “The largest increase in extreme fire behavior was in the temperate conifer forests of the Western U.S. and the boreal forests of northern North America and Russia.”

There are good reasons for that increase.

Dr. William Keeton, a forester at the University of Vermont, told an interviewer, “We’re seeing the effects of prolonged drought, of a lot less snow in the wintertime, leading to dryer soils, dryer conditions, and the early onset of fires in the spring.”

Robert Wahl of Michigan State University attributed the increased numbers of extreme wildfires to climate change, and said toxic air alerts will be the new normal going forward.

A favorite climate denial talking point claims that the number of total fires in the world has decreased over recent decades – but Australian researchers point out that “this trend is mostly driven by declines in low-intensity fires in African grasslands and savannas,” and “ burn severity, an ecological measure of a fire’s immediate effects (for example, biomass loss and mortality), is increasing in more regions than it is decreasing.”

Researchers in the UK have also found a “worrying increase in forest fire activity, particularly in extratropical regions,” showing a “strong influence of climatic factors”.

While data is inadequate so far to establish a trend, some scientists worry that wildfires we associate with western North America might be moving east, citing recent fires in Florida, the Carolinas, and Georgia.
They point to the Gatlinburg Tennessee fire of 2016, which was small by western standards, but massively destructive and lethal because of higher population density.
In early April, a northern Michigan ice storm caused extensive forest damage, leaving large areas of dead and downed trees, branches and forest trash, which will raise fire risks for years going forward, providing fuel for any odd spark in climate-amplified dry spells. This is an example of how extreme events can feed back and amplify each other.

While it is true that decades of fire suppression allowed a build up of fuels in forest areas, the additional factors of hotter, dryer conditions, and earlier snowmelt have been deadly amplifiers.

Ironically, several Michigan politicians with strong fossil fuel ties and deep records of climate denial, have come forward with a “blame Canada” messaging campaign.

Former Republican representative Candice Miller released a letter scolding Canada for inadequate fire control, without acknowledging the difficulty of fighting flames in sparsely settled roadless areas thousands of miles from population centers.
Representatives Jack Bergman, Tim Walberg, John Moolenaar, and John James, all Republicans, weighed in with complaints to Canadian officials.

No surprise, all have abysmal records on the climate change which exacerbates conditions they pretend to care about.

Miller has a League of Conservation Voters (LCV) lifetime score of 11 percent, having voted repeatedly against limits on global warming pollution.
Bergman and Moolenaar sport 8 percent lifetime scores, with Walberg at a toxic 4 percent .

All have been reliable tools of Big Fossil in spreading climate misinformation, opposing methane standards, sabotaging EPA funding and voting to withdraw from the Paris Agreement

John James has maintained an impressive 10 percent lifetime score, and in 2020 was named to LCV’s “Dirty Dozen” list, reserved for the most psychotic environmental criminals.

In 2023, the impact of toxic smoke shocked Michiganders, yet it’s possible that some still viewed it as a one-off.
It should now be clear to everyone that severe, permanent climate impacts have arrived, even here in Michigan’s “Climate Haven.”

This is our life now, and the damaged planet we are handing off to our children.

It’s hard to express the deep sadness I shared with my son, looking over the lake that I love, watching a blood red sun sink in a cloud of toxic smoke.

Think about what this means for you and your children. 

Then, thank a Climate denier.