During his first week in office, President Donald Trump withdrew from the Paris climate agreement, declared an energy emergency, renewed his vow to “drill, baby, drill,” and began dismantling American climate policy. That has left environmental advocates looking to states to lead the nation’s efforts to burn fewer fossil fuels — and a report released Wednesday shows there is much more they can do.

One of the most powerful tools at each state’s disposal is the ability to work with utilities to encourage energy efficiency. But, the report from the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, or ACEEE, details how only 26 states, along with the District of Columbia, have established a so-called “energy-efficiency resource standard,” or EERS. These targets, set by legislators or utility regulators, require utilities to implement programs — such as weatherization or rebates on appliances — that cut energy consumption by a certain amount each year.

“There is more work that needs to be done,” said Jasmine Mah, a senior research analyst at the Council and an author of the report. Since 2012, just three states have added such a standard, while New Hampshire, Ohio, and Iowa repealed theirs in favor of less ambitious or scaled-back programming. Arizona is also pursuing a rollback. Mah says the report is aimed at state policymakers and regulators, who could shift that tide. 

“We hope that highlighting the positive impacts of having an EERS in place would encourage states to pass a policy,” she said. An earlier ACEEE report found that, as of 2017, states with an energy-efficiency resource standard saw four times the electricity savings as states without one. In 2023, states with such a plan accounted for about 59 percent of the U.S. population but 82 percent of the savings.

“States aren’t doing this just because of climate change,” said Barry Rabe, a political scientist at the University of Michigan who studies energy and climate politics. “There is an economic advantage.”

Fossil-fuel friendly Texas, Rabe noted, was the first to adopt an EERS in 1999. But efficiency can become less of a priority when energy supplies are abundant and costs are stable. “The decline in interest,” Rabe said, “has in some degree coincided with the massive increase in natural gas use in the U.S.” 

Still, the Council also found that many states have gone beyond baseline policies and implemented what the report dubs “next-generation” initiatives that aim to lower greenhouse gas emissions, spur electrification, serve lower-income populations, and reduce consumers’ financial energy burdens. All but four of the 27 states (including D.C.) with an energy-efficiency resource standard have implemented at least one such effort, but only nine have adopted all of them, leaving plenty of room for growth. 

“We found that low-income targets are the most common complementary goal related to efficiency standards,” said Mah. “[But] not many states had provisions for energy affordability.”

The report spotlights five states that have been particularly effective at employing these programs. Illinois has targeted using only clean energy by 2050. Massachusetts aims to install half a million heat pumps by 2030. Michigan mandates that utilities dedicate at least 25 to 35% of their energy-efficiency funding to programs serving low-income customers. Utilities in New York and Minnesota have capped the portion of a customer’s income that can go toward utility costs at 6 and 4%, respectively.

President Trump’s push to repeal the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, or IRA, likely won’t impact state EERSs because they are generally funded through fees added to utility bills. “We see that as probably the best way to bring significant funds,” said Justin Brant, the utility program director at the Southwest Energy Efficiency Project. 

Critics of Arizona’s EERS, which was adopted in 2010, point to the $3 billion cost to customers. “Utilities should select the most cost-effective energy mix to provide reliable and affordable service, without being constrained by government-imposed mandates that make it more expensive for their customers,” said Arizona Corporation Commissioner Nick Myers in a statement last year. But the state’s largest electric utility found that, in 2023, EERS investments reaped about twice as much in returns as was spent. 

“We’re saving money for all customers, even those who aren’t participating,” said Brant. 

The IRA does provide nearly $9 billion for energy-efficiency and electrification programs, almost all of which is distributed via states and could be used on next-generation programs, like those serving low-income households. That money has already been awarded. But the Republican-controlled Congress could roll back federal tax credits for energy efficiency and electrification, which indirectly make it easier for states to achieve their energy-efficiency resource standard and next-generation goals. 

Brant says he would add another policy to the Council’s “next-generation” wishlist for states: programs that encourage customers to spread out the timing of their daily energy use. Lower peak demand means power plants don’t need to be as large and that, he said, will be especially critical as renewable energy becomes an increasing part of the country’s electricity mix. 

“​​Time shift is not something that this report looked at,” he said. “I think that’s another piece that needs to be prioritized.”

This article originally appeared in Grist at https://grist.org/energy/almost-half-of-us-states-havent-done-the-bare-minimum-to-cut-utility-bills/. Sign up for Grist’s weekly newsletter here.

Grist is a nonprofit, independent media organization dedicated to telling stories of climate solutions and a just future. Learn more at Grist.org

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A long-running local government collaboration in southwestern Minnesota is helping to insulate the region from the kind of controversies and misinformation that have plagued rural clean energy projects in other states.

The Rural Minnesota Energy Board has its origins in a regional task force that was set up during the mid-1990s as the state’s first wind farms were being built. The task force was instrumental in persuading state legislators in 2002 to create a wind energy production tax, which today generates millions of dollars in annual revenue for counties and townships that host wind projects.

The group’s scope and membership has since gradually expanded to include 18 rural counties that pay monthly dues for support on energy policy and permitting. The board represents members at the state legislature and in Public Utilities Commission proceedings. At home, it facilitates community meetings with project developers, helps draft energy-related ordinances, and educates members and the public on the benefits of energy projects.

The result, say clean energy advocates and developers, has been a uniquely consistent approach to local energy policy and permitting that makes it easier for renewable companies to do business in the region.

“The rural energy board has been a critical, important body and one of the major reasons why renewable energy has been successful in southwestern Minnesota,” said Adam Sokolski, director of regulatory and legislative affairs at EDF Renewables North America. “Their policies have encouraged good decision-making over the years and led to a stable and productive region for energy development.”

EDF Renewables has worked with the board on at least nine projects in the region. Sokolski said he’s come to admire its approach to policy making, its support for transmission projects, and its efforts to educate members on clean energy. 

“It’s positive to have county leaders talking to each other about energy projects, about how … they can approach those projects so they best benefit their constituents and the public,” he said.

Southwest Minnesota has the state’s densest concentration of wind turbines and is increasingly attracting solar developers, too. Wind turbines account for more than 4,500 megawatts, or around 22%, of the state’s generation capacity, making Minnesota a top 10 state for wind production.

‘It’s all economic development’

The board counts the wind production tax among its most significant accomplishments. Large wind farms pay $1.20 per megawatt-hour of generation. Counties receive 80% of the revenue, with the remainder going to townships. A similar fee also exists for large solar projects.

The fee delivers millions of dollars annually, allowing local governments to construct buildings and repair bridges and roads without raising their levies for years. According to American Clean Power, Minnesota municipalities receive $44 million annually in taxes, and private landowners receive nearly $41 million in lease payments from wind and solar companies.

That has enabled counties to stave off opposition by pointing out that turbines and solar are economic development, according to Jason Walker, community development director for the Southwest Regional Development Commission, which manages the board, said the local government revenue generated from wind and solar projects has helped reduce opposition to projects.

“It’s all economic development here,” Walker said.

When opposition does emerge, such as around a recent 160 megawatt solar project in Rock County in the state’s far southwest corner, the board works with commissioners to make sure local leaders have factual information as opposed to misinformation.

Peder Mewis, regional policy director for the Clean Grid Alliance, praised the board for creating an information-sharing culture among members that helps prepare them for clean energy development. He said many developers appreciate that the region’s ordinances are similar because of the board, and that they have maintained good relationships with members over the years.

“There are other parts of the state that are thinking, ‘Is there something here that we could replicate or duplicate?’” Mewis said.

Jay Trusty, executive director of the Southwest Regional Development Commission, said the board plays an essential role in lobbying for state policy to support clean energy development. In addition to the production taxes, the board regularly defends the local distribution of those funds when lawmakers consider other uses for the revenue. The board more recently lobbied for changes to the state transmission permitting process, which were approved this year, and it supported an expansion for Xcel Energy’s CapX 2020 high-voltage transmission project before state utility regulators.

Minnesota Public Utilities Commissioner John Tuma recalled the board’s support for the state’s 2008 renewable energy standard, which gave Republican Gov. Tim Pawlenty important rural support for signing the legislation.

“They bring an economic voice to the table,” Tuma said, adding that the board continues to be active in conversations about regional grid policies.

Nobles County Commissioner Gene Metz has served on the board for 12 years. The region’s decades of experience and collaboration on wind energy has helped make residents more comfortable with clean energy projects, he said, leading to fewer controversies. 

In counties outside the board’s territory, “they’re getting more pushback, especially on solar projects,” he said.

Gene’s cousin, Chad Metz, serves as a commissioner in Traverse County, which is not a member and has a mortarium on clean energy projects. Chad Metz sees clean energy as inevitable and wants the county to join the rural energy board to protect its economic interests. “The benefits outweigh the negatives, and it will just become part of life,” he said.

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Moments before 15-year-old Natalie Rupnow opened fire inside her Madison, Wisc., school, killing two people and herself last month, a social media account believed to be hers posted a photograph on X showing someone sitting in a bathroom stall and flashing a hand gesture that has become a symbol for white supremacy. 

As news about the shooting broke, another X user responded: “Livestream it.” 

Extremism researchers now believe that second account belonged to 17-year-old Solomon Henderson, who police say walked into his high school cafeteria in Nashville, on Wednesday and fired 10 shots, killing one classmate and then himself. Archives of another X account linked to him show that he posted a similar photo to Rupnow’s in his final moments. 

While there isn’t any evidence that Rupnow and Henderson plotted their attacks together, extremism researchers who have tracked their social media activity told Wisconsin Watch and ProPublica that the two teenagers were active in the same online networks that glorify mass shooters, even crossing paths. Across various social media platforms, the networks trade hateful memes alongside terrorist literature, exchange tips on how to effectively commit attacks and encourage one another to carry out their own.

The researchers had been tracking these networks for months as part of work looking into growing online extremist networks that have proliferated across gaming, chatting and social media platforms and that they believe are radicalizing young people to commit mass shootings and other violence.

The researchers’ analysis found only a few instances in which Rupnow and Henderson appeared to interact directly. But in the hours, days and weeks that followed the Madison shooting, Henderson appears to have become fixated on Rupnow. He boasted on X that Rupnow and him were “mutuals,” a common internet term for following each other, and shared another post that said, “i used to be mutuals with someone who is now a real school shooter ;-).”  

The researchers, who have collaborated with counterterrorism organizations, academics and law enforcement to prevent violence by tracking how extremist networks radicalize youth online, agreed to share information as long as they weren’t named out of concerns for their physical safety. The news outlets vetted their credentials with several experts in the field.

It’s impossible to know with complete certainty that online accounts belong to particular people without specialized access to devices and accounts from law enforcement. The Metropolitan Nashville Police Department has acknowledged the existence of two documents they believe Henderson created, both of which contain details about his social media accounts. Other researchers and groups — including The Anti-Defamation League, Canadian extremism expert Marc-André Argentino and SITE Intelligence Group — have also determined these likely belong to Henderson. 

The extremism researchers linked accounts to Rupnow, who went by Samantha, by tracing her activity across multiple social media profiles that revealed common biographical details, including personal acquaintances and that she lived in Wisconsin. On the bathroom post, one person the account regularly interacted with referred to Rupnow by her nickname, “Sam.” Wisconsin Watch and ProPublica were able to verify the social media posts and the connections between the accounts by retracing the researchers’ steps through archived social media accounts and screenshots.

On Thursday, ABC News cited law enforcement sources in reporting that a social media account connected to Henderson may have been in contact with Rupnow’s social media account. The information reviewed by Wisconsin Watch and ProPublica details their suspected connections and interactions. Nearly all of the accounts that researchers have linked to Rupnow and Henderson have now been suspended.

A Madison Police Department spokesperson said the agency knows Rupnow “was very active on social media” and it is “just starting” to receive and review documents from tech companies.  The Nashville police said they had nothing further to add beyond their previous statements. Rubi Patricia Vergara, 14, and Erin West, 42, were killed at Abundant Life Christian School in Madison. Josselin Corea Escalante, 16, died at Antioch High School in Nashville. Both attackers also killed themselves. 

Rupnow and Henderson both had multiple X accounts, the extremism researchers told Wisconsin Watch and ProPublica. At the time of her attack, Rupnow followed just 13 other users. Two of those accounts have been linked to Henderson.

In November, Rupnow shared a post from Henderson, which appeared to wish a happy Veterans Day to the man who killed more than a dozen people at University of Texas at Austin in 1966. 

After the Madison attack, someone wrote to Henderson and others on X, saying that one of their “buddies” may have “shot up a school.” Henderson told another user, “I barely know her,”  and said he had never exchanged private messages with her. Later, in a 51-page screed that Nashville police are examining, he emulated and praised several past attackers including Rupnow and said, “I have connections with some of them only loosely via online messaging platforms.”

After Rupnow’s shooting, Henderson called her a “Saintress,” using a term common in the networks, and posted or reshared posts about her dozens of times, celebrating her racist, genocidal online persona and the fact that she had taken action. On one platform, he used a photograph of her as his profile picture. In his writings, he said he scrawled Rupnow’s name and those of other perpetrators on his weapon and gear.

The online networks the two teenagers inhabited have an array of influences, ideologies and aesthetics. To varying degrees of commitment and sincerity, they ascribe to white supremacist, anti-Semitic, racist, neo-Nazi, occult or satanic beliefs.

In this online world, the currency that buys clout is violence. This violence often involves children and teenagers harming other children and teenagers, some through doxing or encouraging self-harm, others, like Rupnow and Henderson, by committing mass attacks in the nonvirtual world. 

“This network is best described as an online subculture that celebrates violent attacks and radicalizes young people into committing violence,” said one of the violence prevention researchers. “Many of the individuals involved in this network are minors, and we’d like to see intervention to give them the help and support they need, for their own safety as well as those around them.”

Members of some of these communities, including Terrorgram, 764 and Com, have engaged in activities online and offline that have led to convictions for possessing child sexual abuse materials and sexually exploiting a child and indictments for soliciting hate crimes and soliciting the murder of federal officials. The cases are pending, and the defendants have not filed responses in court. This month, the U.S. State Department designated the Terrorgram Collective as a terrorist organization, saying “the group promotes violent white supremacism, solicits attacks on perceived adversaries, and provides guidance and instructional materials on tactics, methods, and targets for attacks, including on critical infrastructure and government officials.”

When details of the Nashville shooting began to emerge, researchers realized they had seen some of Henderson’s accounts and posts within the network of about 100 users they are tracking. They had previously reported one username of an account belonging to Henderson, as well as others within the network to law enforcement and filed several reports with the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children. 

They had not been aware of Rupnow’s accounts before her attack, but were able to locate her within the network after the fact, discovering she had regularly interacted with other accounts they had been following.

Alex Newhouse, an extremism researcher at the University of Colorado, Boulder, said these subcultures have a long history of lionizing and mimicking past attackers while goading each other to enact as much violence as possible — even by assigning “scores” to past attacks, something Henderson engaged with online. “The Antioch one is very obviously copycat,” Newhouse said.

Although Henderson’s diary indicates he had been contemplating an attack for months prior to Rupnow’s, her shooting drew his attention. Hours after, he retweeted another post that said: “There should be a betting market for which rw twitter figure will radicalize the next shooter.” (RW stands for right wing.)

However the two teens entered this online subculture, their writings reveal despair about their personal lives and the world around them and expressed violent, hateful views.

After the Madison shooting, a separate social media user noted their association and tweeted at the FBI, accusing Henderson and others of having prior warning. They “need to be locked up,” the poster said, “no questions asked.”

The FBI declined to comment. But after Henderson’s attack, social media users returned to the tweet: “hey so this guy literally just ended up calling a future school shooter a month ahead of time and the FBI did nothing about it.”

If you or someone you know needs help:

• Call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 988
• Text the Crisis Text Line from anywhere in the U.S. to reach a crisis counselor: 741741

If you or someone you know has been harmed online, you can contact the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children at 1-800-THE-LOST or https://report.cybertip.org/.

This article was produced for ProPublica’s Local Reporting Network in partnership with Wisconsin Watch. Sign up for Dispatches to get stories like this one as soon as they are published.

This article first appeared on Wisconsin Watch and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

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This article was first published by Project Optimist.

A group of southeastern Minnesotans may start an organization to address transportation barriers. 

The organization, called a transportation management organization (TMO) or transportation management association (TMA), can comprise public and private partners who provide and promote “efficient, reliable, and affordable transportation options within a particular region or jurisdiction,” according to a statement from SE MN Together. The organization aims to address transportation, housing, and economic development issues. 

SE MN Together is seeking a TMO after a 2018-2019 study found the region needed a “holistic” and comprehensive approach to address transportation issues impacting workforce mobility, access to services and post-secondary education, and quality of life in southeastern Minnesota.

Organizers don’t specify what initiatives they plan to offer, because they want to learn about the region’s transportation needs, said Joel Young, project manager, in an email to Project Optimist. The fact-finding phase, which includes a survey, focus groups, and an online form to solicit ideas, is underway and funded by a $350,000 appropriation from the 2023 legislative session. Organizers plan to present their findings before a steering committee later this winter. 

If organizers decide to move forward with a TMO, planners will prepare a report on the organization’s structure, budget, and funding sources by June.

What are TMOs?

Association for Commuter Transportation Executive Director David Straus says TMOs vary by location, but they all strive to encourage people to get around by modes other than driving, either through education, ride matching, incentives, or advocacy. They are often funded by public and private entities. 

“The programs and services that they put out there are based on the needs of the community that it’s located in,” Straus said in a phone interview. He said TMOs can foster carpools, administer subsidy programs to encourage people not to drive, or advocate for bicycling, pedestrian, or public transit improvements. He likened it to a chamber of commerce that fosters economic development activity.

Though TMOs exist in rural areas, Straus added they might not necessarily be a good fit. “It can be difficult in a true rural setting where there may not be any large employment basis to support the organization, but at the same time in those cases, the real question would be, what are the transportation challenges that you’re trying to address in those communities?” Straus said. 

“TMAs stretch to more rural, suburban areas all the time,” he said. “That may focus more heavily on carpooling and vanpooling. Depending on the situation and what’s around, they may look at trying to build support for a more flexible mobility-on-demand service, kind of an on-call public transit service that can be put in place. It’s just a matter of being able to have the resources to support it.”

A TMO/TMA in action

One such TMA serving rural communities in Vermont and New Hampshire is the Upper Valley Transportation Management Association, convened in 2001 between Dartmouth College and local nonprofit Vital Communities.

Funded by dues from local communities and employers based on size, the organization, which transit agencies and planning organizations also participate in, educates people on what they can do without a car. For example, the Upper Valley TMA partnered with a local senior center to teach the elderly how they can get around if they can no longer drive, and offered biking workshops.

Vital Communities also administers the “Emergency Ride Home” program for commuters who live on the New Hampshire side of the Upper Valley. Such programs exist across the nation to help commuters who don’t drive to work get home in an emergency by reimbursing their vehicle rental, or taxicab, Uber, or Lyft ride.

However, the program hasn’t gotten any use, because the region doesn’t have many ridehail options. “Some of our towns, there’s no cabs. There’s really no Lyft or Uber. Hanover (N.H.) maybe has one driver sometimes, so there’s just not a lot of other options to get home,” Vital Communities program manager Ellen Hender said.

Even though the program doesn’t get much use, they keep the program because it doesn’t cost them anything to run and want to provide an option for residents living on the New Hampshire side of the Upper Valley. 

Vital Communities gauges success of their TMA by measuring engagement and participation satisfaction. “Effectively, do their individual organizations feel supported by the TMA and is it worth their effort to participate,” Hender said in an e-mail. Membership continues to grow and engagement is “consistent,” Hender said.

TMA opens doors to new partnerships

Vital Communities also leads their own transportation programming outside the scope of the TMA and involves TMA members as partners. 

In one such program, they helped local residents and employers discover e-bikes. Vital Communities provides an e-bike subsidy program, which is funded by a $31,500 Vermont Agency of Transportation mobility grant.

Initially a first come, first served program to persuade middle-income people to purchase an e-bike, Vital Communities changed the program to help those who need a form of transportation based on “social determinants of health or socioeconomic touch points,” said program manager Anna Guenther. The program has helped jobseekers, students who are the first in their family to go to college, people who live without a car or not near a public transit stop, as well as neurospicy individuals who get overstimulated by riding public transit. 

“Owning this valuable and useful item is a real, great stepping stone for them, a bit of security and independence and freedom,” said Guenther. 

How can a TMO succeed in southeast Minnesota?

Straus, Association For Commuter Transportation’s executive director, said a TMO needs collaboration and support from private and public entities to work. 

The effort in Southeastern Minnesota has the ingredients.

The Minnesota Legislature has funded the study. Eight of the region’s employers, who have deployed employee shuttles, vanpools, and carpools, believe help in crafting commuter plans and programs would be a “significant benefit,” according to interviews conducted by SE Minnesota Together. And, dial-a-ride transit agencies said serving rural parts of the region is expensive and time-consuming, though some are already working with local businesses to transport the elderly to medical appointments, as well as children to school. 

“Successful TMAs require that collaboration between public entities and the private sector to make it successful,” Straus said.  “The state, the (metropolitan planning organization), they need to be supportive of the formation of the TMAs and helping them succeed, and the private sector needs to be able to see that support and contribute and buy into the organization, and ultimately the organization needs to be empowered to be able to work with and represent those stakeholders that are there.” 

This story was edited and fact-checked by Jen Zettel-Vandenhouten.

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Originally published by The 19th

Just a day after Trump issued a slate of executive orders aimed at restricting immigration, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced it was rescinding protections for “sensitive zones” where undocumented immigrants were protected from deportation. Some immigrant rights advocates are particularly worried that this could deter women experiencing domestic abuse from going to women’s shelters, which will no longer be protected from U.S. Immigration and Customs  Enforcement (ICE). 

“The Trump Administration will not tie the hands of our brave law enforcement, and instead trusts them to use common sense,” a DHS spokesperson said in a statement. 

The sensitive zones policy, which was created in 2011, initially applied to places like churches, schools and hospitals. In 2021, the list of places was expanded by the Biden administration to include locations offering disaster or emergency relief and social services. The policy was put in place to allow undocumented immigrants access to essential services like health care without the threat of being deported. ICE could enter these places only if there was a threat of terrorism or imminent risk of death, among other exceptions.  

“What is really important about sensitive zones is that they allow migrant women and families to safely access these spaces without fear that ICE will arrest or deport them there,” said Zain Lakhani, director of the Migrant Rights and Justice Program at the Women’s Refugee Commission. “The impact might be, for instance, that a domestic violence survivor will stay in an abusive situation because they’re being forced to choose between their immediate safety and arrest and deportation if they go to a shelter or take their children to a shelter.” 

The administration could further hamper services for those experiencing domestic violence by expanding the definition of a “public charge,” which Trump did in his first term, though it was struck down by a federal court a year later. The public charge rule, which had previously been defined by a 1999 field guidance, means people can be turned down for visas or green cards if they are determined to be dependent on the government financially. 

This rule had typically been restricted to cash-assistance initiatives like the Temporary Assistance for Needy Family program, but Trump expanded it to include non-cash assistance programs like food stamps and Section 8 housing. Trump also changed the length of time someone could be in assistance programs before becoming ineligible, leading to a lot of uncertainty over who would be deemed a public charge. Many immigrants were less likely to enroll in programs during this time, even if they were eligible. 

That had a particular impact on victims of domestic violence. The public charge rule did not apply to people with a U or T visa, which is available to victims of human trafficking and violent crimes like domestic violence. But the change in definition caused confusion both among people dispensing legal advice and the visa recipients themselves, who were entitled to some of these benefits but scared to access them. Housing or food assistance can be the difference between someone staying or leaving an abusive situation, Lakhani said. 

“There was just a lot of confusion and a huge amount of chilling,” she said.

And now, even the U and T visa program could be dismantled by the Trump administration as called for by Project 2025, which is largely seen as the policy blueprint for Trump’s second term.

When someone applies for this visa, it creates an alert to immigration authorities that bars ICE from taking any enforcement action against a person if a tip comes in from the person committing the abuse. Ultimately, that stops abusers or human traffickers from being able to threaten people with deportation, Lakhani said. 

While these visa programs need an act of Congress to be overturned, Lakhani said, there are levers the administration can pull to make the program ineffective. For example, they could decide to pause new applications for any visa category that is heavily backlogged. U visa applicants are currently waiting around 15 years for resolution of their cases, she said. 

“The times are just astronomical, right? And so, of course, that is going to be considered a very heavily backlogged category, and so they could essentially cut off all access,” Lakhani said.

“So much of these policies, what they do is instill fear, and I think that’s really critical,” Lakhani said. “It’s extremely dangerous because the state doesn’t even need to enforce them, in order people self-select out, and it forces them into these impossible, impossible choices.”

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Flood control along the Mississippi River is a central piece of a newly passed federal law — work that advocates believe is critical as the river basin sees more frequent and severe extreme weather events due to climate change. 

The Water Resources Development Act (WRDA) is passed by Congress every two years. It gives authority to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to undertake projects and studies to improve the nation’s water resources. 

Signed into law Jan. 4, this year’s package includes studies on increased flooding in the upper basin, flood mitigation measures throughout the river system, ecological restoration, and a $6 billion floodwall in Louisiana. 

The Mississippi River is managed in large part by the Army Corps, so it often features prominently in the bill, with a dual aim of making the river more suitable for shipping and restoring environmental degradation from flooding, nutrient pollution and climate change. 

Kirsten Wallace, executive director of the Upper Mississippi River Basin Association, called this year’s WRDA “a pretty special one.” She said it contained wins for many of the diverse stakeholders along the river, including shippers, environmental advocates, riverfront communities and federal and state agencies — who don’t always agree. 

Advocates lauded the law’s emphasis on nature-based solutions. In a press release, Stephanie Bailenson, policy team lead for The Nature Conservancy, said, “Since 2016, Congress has directed the Corps to consider natural and nature-based solutions alongside or instead of traditional infrastructure. This latest act continues that trend.”

But all of these projects are only promised, because funding doesn’t come until later, when Congress appropriates it. Many projects authorized in previous versions of the law are still unfunded, according to the Congressional Research Service.

Here’s what will affect the river in the Water Resources Development Act of 2024: 

Study of flood risk on the upper Mississippi River

The law authorizes a large-scale study of flooding on the Upper Mississippi River System, which includes the Mississippi River from its headwaters to where it meets the Ohio River at Cairo, Illinois, as well as the Illinois River and portions of some smaller tributaries.

The upper river has seen two major floods in the last few years; one in 2023, and one in 2019, which lasted for months and caused billions of dollars in damage. 

The study’s chief goal: figuring out how to reduce flood risk across the entire river system, instead of relying on municipalities to try to solve flooding problems themselves, which can sometimes have impacts downstream. North of St. Louis, for example, levees constrain the river to protect communities and valuable farmland from flooding — and some levee districts have raised those levees higher, safeguarding themselves but effectively pushing floodwaters faster downstream. 

“This plan allows more of a comprehensive way for levee districts to improve what they currently have … in a way that doesn’t put them in a position to be adversarial or just impose risk somewhere else,” Wallace said. 

She said the study will be a challenge, but that levee districts are eager for solutions as flood risks and heavier rainfall increase. 

Once the study receives funding, it will be led by the Army Corps’ St. Louis District, Wallace said. It’ll solicit input from cities, towns and ports along the river, recreators, the shipping industry and federal environmental agencies like the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the U.S. Geological Survey. 

Flood projects for cities from the headwaters to the delta 

Cities and towns along the river could get help for the localized effects of flooding too, thanks to several projects authorized by the law. Upstream, that includes La Crosse, Wisconsin, which will enter into an agreement with the Army Corps to study the role of the city’s levees, which were constructed around the river’s record flood in 1965. 

“We have to have an eye on maintaining what we’ve got and looking toward the future and whatever conditions the river might undergo to be prepared as best we can,” said Matthew Gallager, the city’s director of engineering and public works. “Because obviously, nature is going to win.” 

Downriver, Louisiana secured the largest project authorization within the law. To protect communities in St. Tammany Parish, a county north of Lake Pontchartrain, Louisiana plans to build a $5.9 billion levee and floodwall system totaling 18.5 miles in length to protect over 26,000 structures, most of which are family homes. 

The St. Tammany Flood Risk Management Project is slated to receive $3.7 billion in federal funding. The other 35% will come from non-federal sponsors, such as the Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority (CPRA). 

“By authorizing the St. Tammany project for construction, Congress recognizes again the national importance of Louisiana and that CPRA can work with the Federal Government to execute a multi-billion coastal protection project successfully,” said CPRA Chairman Gordy Dove.

The law also authorizes a federal study of the Lake Pontchartrain Storm Surge Reduction Project, a component of Louisiana’s Coastal Master Plan meant to protect nine parishes bordering the lake. The Army Corps will investigate whether the proposed project to reduce flood risk is in the federal interest. 

Other approved flood control projects will be funded along the lower Mississippi River and its tributaries, including the Ouachita River in Louisiana. Several counties in Mississippi will also receive funding to improve environmental infrastructure, such as water and wastewater systems. 

Near Memphis, the bill authorizes the Hatchie-Loosahatchie Ecosystem Restoration project, which covers a 39-mile stretch of the lower Mississippi River. The project aims to manage flood risks while also restoring and sustaining the health, productivity and biological diversity of the flyway. 

In New Orleans, a study was authorized to investigate ecosystem restoration and water supply issues, such as the mitigation of future saltwater wedges that threaten drinking water and wetlands at the very end of the Mississippi River. 

More support for the Upper Mississippi River Restoration program 

The law also increases the amount of money Congress can give to the Upper Mississippi River Restoration program, which funds habitat restoration activities and scientific research on the upper river. 

Congress increased the money it can direct to the research part of the program by $10 million, bringing the total the program can get to $100 million annually. 

The boost “really is a recognition of the value of the science … the understanding that has improved about how the system is functioning over the last three decades,” said Marshall Plumley, the Army Corps’ regional manager for the program. 

If given extra funding, Plumley said program staff want to use it to better understand the effects of the increased amount of water that has flowed through the river in recent years. That increase, partly attributed to wetter conditions due to climate change, is changing the river’s floodplain habitats, including forests and backwater areas. 

A change to how new water infrastructure gets funded

The Mississippi River functions as a water superhighway, transporting around $500 million tons of goods each year. Infrastructure to keep shipping running smoothly is costly, and one adjustment in WRDA 2024 is aimed at shifting the burden of those costs. 

Taxpayers have been funding inland waterway infrastructure for nearly two centuries, but Congress established the Inland Waterways Trust Fund in 1978, which requires the private shipping industry to pitch in. 

Today, the trust fund’s coffers are filled by a 29-cent per gallon diesel tax on commercial operators that use the Mississippi River and other inland waterways, adding up to about $125 million per year in recent years. New construction — like wider, more modern locks and dams on the upper river — is paid for through a public-private partnership: the private dollars in the fund, and federal dollars allocated by Congress. 

Until recently, the private dollars covered 35% of new construction costs and federal dollars covered 65%. The new WRDA adjusts that to 25% and 75%, respectively. 

Advocates for the shipping industry have long believed taxpayers should have a bigger hand in funding construction because it’s not just shippers who benefit from an efficient river. 

The balance in the trust fund “always limits” construction that can happen in a given year, said Jen Armstrong, director of government relations for the Waterways Council. 

“We can’t afford to have projects take three decades or two decades to complete,” Armstrong said, “because we have other locks that are deteriorating.” 

Armstrong said she believes shifting more of the cost to the federal government will accelerate those projects. 

Not everyone supports the cost share change, however, including American Rivers, which has opposed the creation of new locks on the upper Mississippi in favor of helping the river revert to more natural processes. 

Kelsey Cruickshank, the group’s director of policy and government relations, called it “a disappointing development that continues to give short shrift to the incredible ecosystem of the world’s third-largest freshwater river system.”

Editor’s note: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated the upper river experienced major floods in 2022, the floods were in 2023. This story has been updated. 

This story is a product of the Mississippi River Basin Ag & Water Desk, an independent reporting network based at the University of Missouri in partnership with Report for America, with major funding from the Walton Family Foundation. The Nature Conservancy and American Rivers also receive Walton funding.

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Prairie du Rocher, Ill. — On a cold winter day in Illinois, three little pigs are resting in a three-sided shed. They have plenty of space to trot around, as they do when Jennifer Duensing approaches. Those footsteps mean it’s feeding time. They squeal impatiently, waiting for their usual diet of organic feed, which sometimes includes vegetables like squash grown right here on the farm. 

The farm, Illinois Country Harvest, had been in Duensing’s family for generations when she took it over in 2015. She was new to farming, so there was a lot to learn about how to best manage the near-12 acres now under her purview. But one thing she definitely knew was that she wanted to manage the land, crops and animals without chemical inputs.

“We use absolutely zero chemicals, which means if we have pests, we don’t spray,” she said.  

There are countless certifications she could have chosen and labels she could slap on her products to try and prove her farm has good practices. In the midst of rising consumer demand for organic foods, a nonprofit called “A Greener World” which “promotes practical, sustainable solutions in agriculture by supporting farmers and educating consumers” has a 15-page guide that attempts to clear up consumer confusion around labels that use terms like “natural,” “humane” and “organic.” 

Certified Naturally Grown was a perfect fit for how she was already running her farm. 

“Our certification process is really pretty simple, because we have zero chemical inputs,” she said. “There’s nothing we had to justify or have reasoning for, because we just do not use anything.”

Started in 2002, the non-profit organization’s standards are modeled after the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Certified Organic Label, but they’re designed to give farmers a cheaper and more accessible way to certify and communicate how their farms work.  

“A lot of farmers are committed to ecological practices, and probably would qualify for organic certification, but they hesitate because of the expense and also the paperwork,” said Alice Varon, CNG’s executive director.

“There’s some minor differences, but for the most part, it’s just like the National Organic Program.” she added. 

USDA Organic certification vs. CNG

Liz Graznak is a certified organic farmer in Jamestown, Mo. The program’s requirements vary by produce and animal, but generally, it requires the use of “eco-friendly pest control,” “natural fertilizers,” and for farmers to allow animals to “roam freely outdoors.” She has to renew her certification every year.

After adopting organic practices, the next  step is applying to a USDA-accredited certifying agent. While there are more than 17,000 certified organic farms operating in the U.S, there are less than 80 certifying agencies. They send inspectors out to interview farmers and check that they are abiding by the USDA standards. 

“Someone comes to my farm and pretty much spends the entire day at the farm looking through my records, looking through the records of the crop rotations that I use, what was planted in what field last year, what was planted in that field this year,” Graznak said. “I have those records for 14 years of my farming,”

She pays the certifier for this service, including their travel costs. 

“I was with an agency out of Florida that based their costs on a percentage of my sales,” she said. 

A few years ago, she switched to a closer certifier – based out of Oklahoma. Out of the 73 active agencies, there aren’t any headquartered in Missouri.

Her bill is usually $2,000 to $3,000 a year.

The USDA does have a cost-sharing program that can help reimburse organic farmers for up to 75% of these costs, which is capped at $750 per certification category, which include “crops, wild crops, livestock, processing/handling, and state organic program fees.”

Varon said the reimbursement is useful, but fronting the cash is still a barrier for small operations.  

CNG certification costs just $250 a year. That’s because instead of certifying agencies, CNG farmers are peer-reviewed by other CNG farmers, either in-person or online. CNG provides farmers with training and allows them to virtually observe inspections of other farms.

“It helps keep the program affordable for the farmers because they’re not paying someone to come out and do the annual inspection,” Varon said. “Instead, they agree to conduct a peer review of another farmer if there’s someone nearby who needs one.”

To be certified organic, farmers must stop using chemical inputs for three years, and the certification process typically takes about six months. 

According to CNG’s website, it takes one year of growing and selling before farmers can apply, and certification usually takes two months or fewer. 

The other hurdle CNG is trying to help farmers avoid is laborious bookkeeping. The organic certification requires farmers like Graznak to keep diligent, in-depth and plentiful paperwork of what they do on their farms and when.

“It’s extremely arduous, an immense amount of record keeping for all things that I do on the farm, from the compost that I buy to the seeds that I buy to the fertilizers that I buy,” Graznak said. 

It’s such a common challenge that there are even bookkeeping companies to help farmers remain compliant with the standards.  

“For example, I have to keep very detailed records of planting, seeding, and harvesting,” she said. 

Duensing said the paperwork was a major reason she avoided USDA organic certification.

“That kind of scares me a little bit to be overwhelmed with all that,” she said. 

CNG still requires paperwork, but a lot less. It requires an application that details the farm’s operations, which becomes available to the public. There’s also a form to fill out during annual inspections. They’re also asked to keep receipts of purchases, like seeds, in case an inspector wants to take a look. 

“We want to know how they’re producing the crops, what are the inputs and what seeds they’re using,” Varon said. 

Varon said another benefit to CNG is the networking opportunities from the peer-to-peer inspection.

Jill Beebout runs Blue Gate Farm in Chariton, Iowa. There are two other CNG farms near her, and she says the peer-review process has given her ideas about how to better her own farm. 

“I’ve learned great things about improving our fruit tree production or orchard management, things that I didn’t know,” she said. 

CNG peaked with around 800 certified farms around 2018. Post-pandemic, they’re down to 600. Varon says that may say less about CNG and more about general trends in farming – the number of farms has been steadily decreasing, while the average farm size has been increasing, according to the USDA. In 2023, the average size of a U.S. farm was 464 acres. Most CNG farms are just 2-10 acres. 

Varon said they typically ask farmers who choose not to renew their certification why they left the program. 

“The main reasons are they’ve stopped farming, or they can’t justify the cost and effort of certification with the value it’s bringing to them,” she said. 

The USDA doesn’t publish surveys on the National Organic Program every year, but between 2021 and 2019, there was a 5% increase in the number of organic producers.

Label confusion

While some seek out certification alternatives to the organic label, Graznak says the cost and “arduous” process of getting USDA’s certification are worth it because the label is both recognizable and trusted. 

“The public knows what the USDA label is, they recognize that, and it means something,” Graznak said. 

According to a survey by a trade association of organic businesses, she’s right. The group’s 2024 survey estimates that the label is “trusted by 70 percent of consumers.” 

Graznak said it’s a quick way to communicate how she grows her produce, which is particularly important because she sells in retail and wholesale spaces where she can’t have conversations with every customer. 

“I sell to 500 plus customers every Saturday (at the farmers market), and I can’t have a long detailed conversation with all of them.” she said.

With so many labels on the market, there aren’t a lot of things that can cut through the noise like the USDA’s Certified organic label, and there are a lot of gaps in knowledge about what they even mean. 

David Lovelady purchased produce from Graznak at the Columbia Farmers Market. Eating healthy is important to him, but he says the current labeling system is confusing..

“It’s a leap of faith,” he said. “There will probably be an additional cost to these particular labels, (like USDA Certified Organic) but I don’t mind that. I want to make sure that I put good fuel in my body, because I feel it’s a temple, so I want to make sure that I get what I pay for.”

Another customer, Barbara Parker, agreed. 

“It’s kind of like playing Russian roulette with your food,” Parker said. “You want to know that your cows ate grass, you don’t want to know that your cows ate ‘question mark.’”

An uphill battle 

Sharon Gray at the University of Connecticut’s Department of Extension works on fixing the knowledge gap around labels. She educates consumers about nutrition and what food labels do or don’t mean.

She said consumers sometimes see terms like “natural” as buzzwords without backing, so Certified Naturally Grown might be in an uphill battle to earn trust and recognition. 

“People do like purchasing natural foods,” Gray said. “I think right now, it’s just the definition isn’t clear enough that people buy it, and it’s not necessarily regulated.”

CNG is making an effort to increase its name recognition and opportunities for certified producers. 

“We have some funding from the USDA for a three-year project to really invest in expanding customer awareness of what it means for a farm to be Certified Naturally Grown,” Varon said. 

The grant was given through the USDA’s Farmers Market Promotion Program. CNG received over $400,000 for the project, with the goal of “Opening Doors and Boosting Sales for Local and Certified Producers.” It will start in western Virginia and central Arkansas and will roll out to a third location sometime in the next three years. 

“We really want to expand the purchasing of local direct sales from farmers to independent grocers of locally produced food, and then help those grocers feature what food is local and what food is certified,” Varon said.

With the money, they’ll also train farmers in marketing their business and reach out to grocers, influencers and media to do outreach about local producers and what labels like CNG mean. 

But some CNG farmers don’t seem too worried about the label’s recognition. Duensing, of Illinois Country Harvest, has a small operation and sells directly to consumers. She’s not in retail stores and she’s able to directly show and tell her customers exactly how her animals are treated and how her produce is grown. 

She said that communicates more than any label could. For her, being Certified Naturally Grown is to prove to her consumers, and herself, that she’s following those standards correctly. 

“I feel like some people who say that they grow naturally and don’t go through the certification process may not have the correct understanding of what growing naturally is,” Duesning said.

 Just like consumers, producers aren’t always correct about what food labels mean, she said, and the CNG helps give both sides that assurance. As someone on both sides, Duensing is glad that both her family and her customers can feel confident in her food. 

“It’s how we want to live,” she said. “It’s not only how we want to put our products out there… this is how we want to eat. We want to eat chemical-free. We want to live chemical-free.”

This story is a product of the Mississippi River Basin Ag & Water Desk, an independent reporting network based at the University of Missouri in partnership with Report for America, with major funding from the Walton Family Foundation.

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A Seattle-based company wants to become the Netflix of the recycling industry. It collects recyclables via subscription-style service.

Minnesota residents threw 2.2 million tons of waste into landfills in 2022, according to data from the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency. Ridwell aims to lower that amount.

In 2024, Twin Cities Ridwell customers collected over 500,000 pounds of plastic film, said Jens Narveson, Ridwell’s Minneapolis operations manager. That’s about the same as recycling the weight of 40 elephants.

Ridwell makes it convenient for people to recycle items that aren’t accepted by their curbside haulers, like clothes, light bulbs, electronics, batteries, multi-layer plastics, and styrofoam, Narveson said.

How it works

People in Ridwell’s service area can sign up for one of three subscription options: $14 per month, $18 per month, or $24 per month. The middle option allows customers to recycle multi-layer plastic – think potato chip bags and granola bar wrappers. The most expensive option is called the Unlimited plan and offers customers extra bags at no additional charge. 

Items are collected from customers on a bi-weekly basis, Narveson said. People can use a portal on the company’s website, the Ridwell app, or click a link in an email or text message reminder to indicate when they have items ready for pick-up.

Then, they put their items in a designated bag and place that bag in a Ridwell bin outside their front door. A driver will collect the bag and leave a clean, empty bag for them to fill. 

The items are taken to Ridwell’s St. Paul warehouse, where employees process them.

The company works with partner organizations to make sure the items are reused or recycled. So in the Twin Cities, clothes donated to Ridwell go to Goodwill. Multi-layer plastics are sent to a company called HydroBlox that uses the plastic to make drainage planks, Narveson said.

Related | Could resource recovery parks help Hennepin County get to zero waste?

The company tracks where materials go after they leave the warehouse, said Rebecca Hayes, regional director at Ridwell. 

At ridwell.com/transparency, customers can see where the materials go by market, what the contamination percentage is, and what the top contaminants are for each material. 

The top contaminants for plastic film in Minneapolis are paper bubble mailers and mixed material bags, for example.

Challenges

Ridwell intentionally accepts items that aren’t accepted curbside to avoid duplicating services, Narveson said. 

But one of the biggest challenges for Narveson is with styrofoam. The company can only take a specific kind of styrofoam – thin, white sheets that can crack in half – and there’s only one processing center in the area. While takeaway containers are accepted, contamination is an issue.

“The number one cause of contamination for us is styrofoam takeaway containers that’s dirty, has food waste on it, because we can’t take that,” Narveson said.

It’s also important for customers to put items in their designated bags, particularly batteries, Narveson said. 

“The big one is making sure batteries go up in the battery bag. It’s always the fear of a lithium battery going in a compactor and something blowing,” they said. “Really just making sure you put your stuff in the right bags, because that’s how we avoid accidents like that.”

Possible rural expansion?

The company serves about 8,000 residents across the Twin Cities metro area, Narveson said. Ridwell came to Minnesota because of how conscious people are about the environment. 

It operates in major cities because their population density makes financial sense, Narveson said. Besides Minneapolis, Ridwell has operations in Atlanta, Austin, Texas, California’s Bay Area, Denver, Los Angeles, Portland and Seattle Hayes said.

“It’s about how many customers get in an area to make it less mileage, less cost on us, so that’s kind of the big impact,” Narveson said. 

What would a rural service look like? 

Narveson said the company is currently testing an option where residents who live outside a Ridwell service area could mail in their recyclables.

In action

Ridwell has worked with Bridging, a nonprofit organization in the Twin Cities, since Ridwell set up shop in Minnesota in 2022, said Diana Dalsin, Bridging’s director of strategic partnerships. The organization provides furnishings and home goods to people in need; they set up 120 households per week. 

Ridwell offers a rotating “featured” category. When Project Optimist visited the warehouse, the featured item was wearable bras. They’ve also collected campaign yard signs, Christmas lights, food, diapers, and denim, Narveson said.

Four special collections in the featured category benefit Bridging annually, Dalsin said. Members donated items like cookware, silverware, and hangers. 

Bridging volunteers also test light bulbs that Ridwell members donate in case any are still good. They keep light bulbs that work, and send the rest back to Ridwell for recycling. Bridging keeps track of the usable lights, and Dalsin said 25-30% of each giant box contains good bulbs.

Ridwell makes reuse convenient, which drives participation, Dalsin said. 

“It’s exciting, because for people like myself who are in the business of reuse, it is hard to activate people, so you do have to make it easy,” she said. “And making it easy and convenient is what we’re doing with Ridwell.”

Becki Erickson subscribed to Ridwell about 18 months ago. The Roseville resident said she always donated items to places like Goodwill, so the convenience appealed to her. 

“I also really like the rotation, the special category every other week. It helps me to clean out my house, and especially look for things that I don’t use at all and that somebody might be looking for,” Erickson said.

Erickson posted to her local “Buy Nothing” Facebook group to see if anyone wanted to contribute bras “that still have some life in them,” she said. 

“All of a sudden, a whole bunch of people started donating bras at my house. We had 50 bras get picked up last week just from my house,” she said. 

One downside of the service is that unless you’re on the Unlimited plan, you have to pay for extra bags if you have a surplus of items. Erickson’s family tends to have a lot of clothes and plastics, so she puts in what she can with each pick-up. 

Erickson said she noticed an unexpected benefit: Her children are learning about recycling and sustainability. 

“I feel like they’re just decades ahead of where I was in terms of knowing how to reduce, reuse, recycle, and wanting to do their part,” she said. 

This story was edited and fact-checked by Nora Hertel.

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This article originally appeared on Inside Climate News, a nonprofit, non-partisan news organization that covers climate, energy and the environment. Sign up for their newsletter here.

Andrew Garberson has a message for drivers in cold-climate states like Minnesota: Yes, you can still drive an electric car.

Public scrutiny over how well EVs perform in cold weather has grown in recent years following high-profile incidents, like one in Chicago last winter, when several Tesla drivers found themselves stuck in line for hours, waiting for their turn at public charging stations as temperatures dipped below zero. Many drivers reported that the cold had not only sapped their batteries of power but also made charging them a major hassle.

Cold weather temporarily reduces the available energy of EV batteries and slows their ability to charge — though they’ll function normally again in warmer conditions. Heating the car’s cabin during winter also requires energy from the battery, meaning less fuel for travel.

Research has found that freezing temperatures can reduce the average driving range of an electric vehicle anywhere from 25% to 41%, depending on the circumstances. So, a car that can drive 100 miles on a single charge when it’s 70 degrees Fahrenheit outside may only be capable of going 59 to 75 miles in freezing temperatures.

But Garberson, who lives in Iowa and works as the head of growth and research for the EV advocacy group Recurrent, said incidents like the one in Chicago have been overblown in the media, and that drivers shouldn’t avoid buying an electric car just because they live somewhere with cold winters.

“I drive an EV every day, and my winter is almost as harsh as yours [in Minnesota],” he said. “The anxiety around winter and reduced range, while it’s not inaccurate, is just a bit overhyped.”

EVs aren’t the only cars to suffer performance issues under frigid conditions. Conventional gasoline cars lose between 10 percent and 20 percent of their driving range when the temperature drops from 77 degrees Fahrenheit to 20 degrees, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.

If drivers are properly prepared, most EVs should hold up fine in cold situations, Garberson said. Drivers can take certain steps to ensure their commute goes as smoothly as possible, he added, such as preconditioning their batteries before charging them — a setting on most modern EV models that warms the battery to an optimal temperature, allowing for faster charging.

Recurrent also reviews EV models every year to see how much cold weather impacts their range, which could help shoppers choose which model would work best for their needs, Garberson said. This year, the organization looked at 13 popular models, analyzing real-world driving data from over 10,000 vehicles. It found that those models lost 21% of their range on average when temperatures drop to 32 degrees Fahrenheit. But the loss varied drastically by model and year.

The Tesla Model X had the smallest range loss, with an 11 percent decrease, while the Volkswagen ID.4 had the largest at 37%. The biggest factor, Garberson said, was whether the vehicle had a heat pump, which is more efficient than conventional heating systems and therefore reduces overall power use. Studies show that the power needed to heat the car’s cabin is a big reason for range loss.

The EV models that did not utilize a heat pump, including the ID.4, saw their batteries reduced by an average of 28%, compared to an average of 13% for cars with heat pumps, Recurrent’s analysis found. Overall, heat pumps added roughly 10% extra range to cars during freezing conditions, the report said.

Garberson said cars built in 2020 or later are more likely to have heat pumps installed than older models. Many popular models now have them or will soon have them, he added, noting that Ford added heat pumps to its 2024 F-150 Lightning and is adding them to its Mustang Mach-E in 2025.

“A lot of the [car companies] have added heat pumps because they’ve realized how important it is for people in northern climates,” Gaberson said. “So that’s my No. 1 piece of advice, is just do a little bit of research about the technology in the car because it can make a 10 to 15% difference in overall range.”

Ingrid Malmgren didn’t know her Tesla Model Y, which she bought in November 2022, had a heat pump when she decided to take her family on a four-hour road trip from her Vermont home to Quebec City, Canada, last February. The day they left, she said, the high was 7% Fahrenheit.

“I’m not gonna lie, I was nervous about it,” said Malmgren, who works as the senior policy director for Plug In America, another EV advocacy organization. “But it was a complete non-issue. We charged once along the way.”

Malmgren said her experience is a common one for first-time EV buyers. A recent Plug In America survey of more than 3,000 EV owners found that 70% of the respondents worried about battery range before buying an electric car. The survey, however, also found that only 35 percent remained concerned after owning an EV.

“What we’ve found with our Plug In America survey is that a lot of people have concerns about cold weather operation of electric vehicles,” she said. “But once they get in an electric vehicle, once they start driving an electric vehicle consistently, they find that these concerns go away.”

The vast majority of the EV owners who remain concerned about range own EVs built before 2020 and live in rural areas, Malmgren added, where charging infrastructure is scarcer and drivers typically travel longer distances.

The survey also ranked owner satisfaction for different EV models, including for the car’s battery range. Out of the 14 different EV models included, Rivan’s R1T truck received the highest satisfaction rating for range performance from the survey respondents. Tesla’s Model Y sedan received the second-highest rating.

Charging speed may be another factor prospective EV buyers want to consider. Garberson said newer models can typically charge faster than older models. His 2021 Hyundai Kona can charge in 30 to 40 minutes, he said, while his wife, who drives a 2023 Hyundai Ioniq 5, can charge her car in 12 to 14 minutes. Some used EVs that were built a decade or more ago, while cheaper, may take even longer to charge or require multiple charges a day, he added.

The most important thing to consider is your driving habits, Garberson said, adding that most drivers won’t even notice when their EV loses range during cold weather.

“The average daily driving distance, it’s like 30.2 miles,” he said. “So it doesn’t matter what EV you have. Any difference in range and cold conditions — or hot conditions, for that matter — isn’t going to be something that materially impacts your daily driving.”

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Jay Dee Nichols stamped and packed stiff willow branches between maple wood posts, with muffled crunches.

At 63, the semi-retired handyman from the Wisconsin city of Black River Falls has trapped beavers before. But he’s never heard of a mock beaver dam — much less constructed one.

“It gives you an appreciation for what beavers do,” Nichols said over the shrill beeping of a skid loader. A scratch on his forearm oozed blood, drying into a scarlet smudge.

“They’re one of the hardest-working animals out there, I guess.”

Nichols’ muck boots sloshed in a pool of water that already was forming behind the freshly constructed beaver dam analog, or BDA. The semi-porous wooden structures are often installed across streams to redirect water or capture sediment.

Nichols and three other workers were as busy as beavers for a week in October constructing 12 of them in a forested wetland. 

It’s all part of Jim Hoffman’s latest project.

The BDAs span an unnamed, man-made channel that drains overflow from a reservoir on Hoffman’s cranberry farm, north of Alma Center in Jackson County. The water runs into South Fork Halls Creek, a trout stream where actual beavers have taken up residence.

Hoffman, 60, hopes the BDAs, which could pool up to 1.7 acre-feet of water during floods, improve water quality, stabilize eroded stream banks and enhance wildlife habitat. Most of all, he seeks to trailblaze a path through the state’s onerous dam-permitting process so other Wisconsin landowners can follow in his footsteps.

“There’s a lot of different streams and tributaries that could benefit from this,” Hoffman said.

As average Wisconsin temperatures and precipitation increase in response to climate change, scientists, environmentalists and regulators point to the promise of nature-based solutions. 

Enter the beaver.

North America’s largest rodent is infamous for wood munching. Where they chew, wetlands often follow. The natural sponges filter water and offer flood protection.

The U.S. once was home to 60 million to 400 million beavers, which inhabited a range extending from the northern Mexican deserts to the Arctic tundra. But European and American settlers hunted them to near extinction.

As their population dwindled and agriculture and urban development expanded, wetlands disappeared. Wisconsin, like the rest of the country, lost roughly half since the late 1700s.

Without maintenance from nature’s “ecosystem engineers,” many of the nation’s once multi-threaded streams also became single-channeled and incised — disconnected from their floodplains. When this happens, water tables sink, water temperature increases and plants die. If torrential floodwaters funnel through the simple stream systems, they flush out wildlife and wood.

Nature can repair itself, but the process of restoring stream complexity can take millennia. Mock beaver dams can jump-start the process, reducing the timing to mere decades.

They also can slow the flow of runoff and allow watersheds to store more water. Hoffman sees their potential to limit flooding in Wisconsin, potentially saving taxpayer dollars and creating wildlife habitat.

Watershed councils, conservation districts, Indigenous tribes, and state and federal natural resources agencies frequently deploy them in the American West. But their use in Wisconsin, a state with a historically tempestuous relationship with beavers, is novel. Many regulators believe the critters’ dams harm trout, and the state’s fisheries and forestry divisions contract with the U.S. Department of Agriculture to wipe out beavers that live on designated streams.

Fewer than a dozen permitted projects that incorporate BDAs or similar wooden structures have been built in Wisconsin to date. The Department of Natural Resources recently approved two on trout stream tributaries, signaling an openness to test their potential despite concerns from fisheries managers. Construction is underway in other Mississippi River basin states too, including Iowa, Kentucky and Missouri.

Wisconsin regulators generally treat BDAs as dams that impound water, making for an arduous and expensive permitting process. 

Hoffman spent more than a year and $20,000 to obtain his permit. He is the CEO of a vast Wisconsin construction company and has a running joke.

“The one thing you never do is call the (Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources) and ask them, ‘Do I need a permit for this?’” he said.

What are beaver dam analogs? 

A healthy streamscape requires space for water to slowly meander. That requires messy wood obstructions like fallen trees and debris-filled logjams.

Much like real beaver dams, the analogs obstruct water and disperse the flow across a wider area. Water pools above and below the dams, and upstream surface height increases.

Sediment accumulates behind the obstructions, sometimes transforming an upstream pool into a wetland and eventually a meadow. But nature’s randomness means beaver dams or analogs can fail.

BDAs are not in themselves a solution, experts say, but tools that initiate natural processes that mend degraded waterscapes. 

While their popularity increased in the 2000s, historic drawings indicate that small wicker and log dams were constructed as early as the 19th century to “correct” streams in France.

Construction these days hasn’t changed much, with workers pounding posts directly into a streambed and weaving willow or juniper branches between them. Gaps can be plugged with sediment. The analogs, which are biodegradable and transient, function well when constructed in sequence like natural beaver dam complexes. Proponents hope that using natural materials and hand labor reduces building costs, enabling more miles of restoration.

When human and beaver engineers meet

When Hoffman installed his cranberry marshes more than 20 years ago, a developer taught him an important marketing lesson: christen the business after the resource you are destroying. The developer named his housing division Fox Ridge. Hoffman, in turn, called his cranberry operation Goose Landing.

Yet, in Hoffman’s case, he didn’t necessarily displace geese. Hundreds occupy his reservoir on a given day, leaving droppings that serve as free fertilizer.

The 1,000-acre property serves as a laboratory of earthworks and a wildlife cornucopia. 

Hoffman, a Stanford engineer by training, returned to Wisconsin from San Francisco Bay in 1989 and joined the road construction business his great-grandfather started more than seven decades prior, before the United States had an organized highway system.

After starting the cranberry operation, Hoffman mined frac sand, then obtained his commercial fish farming license. Now, he’s stocked the former mining pits — since filled with water — with an angler’s dream: walleye, hybrid muskie, perch, crappie, bluegill and bass.

Hoffman sped past one of the ponds in his Ford Bronco, pointing out the artificial islands he created. To add vegetation, he grabbed trees by their rootballs and shoved them into the virgin soil.

“I like to change my environment,” he said. “I’m an earthmover by character — by business.”

Hoffman’s efforts to “rewild” his land led him to plant turnip and radish plots for deer along with oak trees to recreate a piece of Wisconsin’s historical savannas. He’s replaced row crops with prairie grass and intends to install an osprey nesting box on one of his ponds — even if it means the birds of prey eat his fish.

Mock beaver dams are Hoffman’s latest push.

His interest in them blossomed after he helped a Nordic skiing buddy release an orphan beaver on his property. They constructed a lodge for the two-year-old rodent, tucking in a stuffed teddy bear to keep it company.

“Well, it instantly swam into the pond, and that was the last we saw it,” Hoffman said.

In a section of forest far from the cranberry marshes, the drainage ditch turns into what appears to be a natural stream, which cuts through steep banks.

On both sides lies what resembles a 3- to 4-foot-tall effigy mound running perpendicular across the creek bed. Hoffman wonders if beavers were the original architects.

“It might be hundreds of years old,” he said. “I’m hoping the beavers come back here and say, ‘Well, we almost got a dam built!’”

Mock beaver dams used out West

Science backs Hoffman’s belief in the restoration power of beaver dam analogs. In one of the first major studies, researchers evaluated their trout impacts and potential to reverse stream incision.

Bridge Creek, a high-desert watershed in north-central Oregon, bore the signs of livestock overgrazing and beaver removal. Following severe storms, the main channel gradually disconnected from the landscape’s floodplain — conditions that persisted even 20 years after cattle stopped chomping on surrounding vegetation.

The researchers monitored conditions before and after installing more than 130 BDAs in Bridge Creek. They compared those sections of creek to areas that lacked BDAs — some that beavers called home and others they did not.

Prior to the study, Bridge Creek contained some beaver dams, but they frequently blew out during major floods. Sediment didn’t have time to accumulate and reconnect the channel to the landscape.

But the BDAs acted as reinforcements. 

Beaver dams in the study area increased more than sevenfold within the first eight years after the scientists added them.

In the BDA sections, land inundated with water increased by 228% and side channels increased by a whopping 1,216%, considerably more than the Bridge Creek sections that lacked them.

As the analogs rehydrated the aquifer, vegetation increased. Groundwater killed off scrubby plants, such as sagebrush, and water-loving willow trees took root.

Could mock beaver dams block or fry fish? 

The impact of beavers on fish remains a hot topic in Wisconsin. For some, it’s axiomatic that beaver dams block trout passage — a belief with a long history.

But that wasn’t a problem at Bridge Creek.

The researchers tagged about 100,000 juvenile trout, enabling antennas to detect fish movement at specific stream locations. They surveyed the stream for more than a decade.

The scientists determined that the installation of mock beaver dams increased the survival, density and reproduction of juvenile trout. They detected no changes to upstream migration in the tagged trout despite the massive increase in human and beaver-made dams. Several spawners passed through upwards of 200 during their migration.

Other studies conducted in California concluded trout easily cross BDAs, either by jumping or swimming up side passages.

Another objection to beaver dams stems from the belief they invariably increase stream temperature: Beaver ponds increase a stream’s surface area, which is warmed by the sun.

But at Bridge Creek, water temperature remained constant or decreased, even during summer. The researchers suggested that pooled water upstream of the dams percolated into the ground, forcing cool groundwater to upwell downstream and mix with that on the surface. An offset to the sun.

The complexes affected temperatures in other ways. 

On one hand, they buffered water temperatures. Stream temperatures periodically fluctuate with day-night cycles and across seasons, but the mock beaver dams compressed the rises and falls. On the other hand, the complexes created variety, filled with warm and cold spots, offering fish a buffet to choose from.

Some studies have documented downstream warming from the analogs. And others from the upper Midwest have documented increased temperatures below natural beaver dam complexes and in beaver ponds, but academics have questioned the research’s scientific rigor.

Nick Bouwes, a Utah State University faculty member who worked on the Bridge Creek study and co-authored a manual that many consider the BDA bible, agrees that the structures could block fish or raise water temperatures in certain ecosystems in his native Wisconsin.

But until there is solid evidence, he said, ultimately those remain assumptions that should be studied.

“It makes you wonder what fish did 3- or 400 years ago when there was an order of magnitude more beaver and an order of magnitude more fish in these systems,” Bouwes said.

Upholding the public trust

In September, Mike Engel, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist, oversaw the installation of beaver dam analogs at Briggs Wetland near Beloit, Wisconsin.

The workshop brought together ecologists, consultants, resource managers and regulators from local, state and federal agencies, most of whom dipped their toes into BDA waters for the first time.

Although passionate about such tools, Engel says beavers and BDAs aren’t a panacea for all degraded wetlands or a warming climate.

“There’s certainly people who will grab a hold of the cute, fuzzy critter and like the idea,” Engel said, standing atop a beaver dam that formed a network of ponds adjacent to the Briggs property. “But I think more people will be interested in managing the amount of water they have — whether they need more or they need less due to climate change.”

In other words, what would a well-functioning watershed look like, and what tools and techniques can achieve those ends? The case for mock beaver dams depends on the setting.

“Out West, they have miles and miles and miles of public land,” said Thomas Nedland, who conducts wetland and waterway permitting with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources.

If the BDAs fail, “all the water that’s backed up ends up going into the woods or the floodplain” without risk to infrastructure, he said. 

“That’s not quite the setting we have here in Wisconsin.”

Such projects might lead to conflicts with property owners, especially if beavers move in and enlarge the structures. They might swamp adjacent corn fields or flood a road or backyard.

Wisconsin’s public trust doctrine also requires regulators to consider the public’s access to natural resources when making permitting decisions. The Department of Natural Resources may impose requirements to maintain the rights to boat, swim and fish, even on artificial ditches that are considered navigable waterways.

Hoffman’s project rang alarm bells for the local county conservationist, who fears the BDAs will attract beavers to the area, leaving floods and unfishable streams in their wake.

Getting the dam permit

State regulators must consider many factors in considering a beaver dam analog.

Throwing some sticks across a streambed is relatively simple, but several Wisconsin installations have relied upon consultants, federal workers or nonprofit organizations to navigate permitting.

“They’re really important devices. They have a lot of functionality. They’re very simple and inexpensive to install,” said Hoffman’s contractor, Clay Frazer, a restoration ecologist. 

“And they’re way too complicated to permit right now for the average person.”

The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources required Hoffman to conduct hydrologic modeling and topographic surveying before regulators approved his BDAs, which stand roughly 3 feet high.

To satisfy regulators that the analog wouldn’t overturn when water pooled behind it, he had to load test the wooden posts.

Joel Pennycamp, a Hoffman Construction Company employee, strapped a scale around the top of one. Hoffman stood on the streambank holding onto the end of a neon orange string that stretched across the BDA. When Pennycamp tugged, each post could move no more than an inch. 

Analog proponents say the rigid requirements to build transient structures unnecessarily increase costs and dampen enthusiasm to use nature-based solutions for landscape repair. A potentially laborious permitting process also misses the broader point that process-based riverscape restoration is unpredictable.

“You don’t have to be an engineer. You don’t have to be able to operate large machinery. You’re not going to completely redesign a stream to what you think it should be,” Bouwes said. “Let the stream figure it out.”

One permitting difficulty stems from, in several instances, the state’s classification of the porous structures as dams. Regulators and applicants debate a principle point: Does a mock beaver dam actually impound water or, as researchers say, merely slow or delay it? State employees say they lack latitude to interpret because BDAs, plain and simple, fit the legal definition.

“I often hear back from applicants and they’re like, ‘Well, it’s not very big,’ or, ‘It’s not intended to be there for long,’ or whatever,” said Uriah Monday, a state dam safety engineer. “But they always acknowledge that they need that pool of water to create the energy it’s going to take to do whatever they’re trying to achieve.”

For instance, he said, a raised pool of water is necessary to saturate wetlands, carve stream meanders and trap sediment upstream.

Hoffman’s stream tributary may be artificial, but the state still considers its waters navigable and thus protected. Normally, when dams obstruct public passage, the Department of Natural Resources requires the posting of a portage route. 

For now, the agency isn’t requiring it, but Hoffman hopes to run with the idea.

“So I’m having some signs made up for the beavers in case they get confused when they’re swimming upstream and hit the dam,” he said, grinning widely.

The department also has authorized BDAs through a streamlined general permitting process. Hoffman’s mock beaver dams, however, did not meet the criteria to qualify.

“I don’t blame the DNR for it,” he said. “It’s just that they don’t have a system to accommodate our request.” 

Kyle Magyera, who performs government outreach with the Wisconsin Wetlands Association, believes regulators should carve out exceptions from the dam rules. 

Monday thinks the existing permitting system can work, as it already has, and will ease as the department learns more about the structures. That will include monitoring at Briggs Wetland and Goose Landing.

“We’re actually hopeful too,” Nedland said. “If there’s an efficient, cost-effective way for people to do these kinds of projects in a much easier way that results in less disturbance to the landscape, like boy, that’s a win.”

BDA permitting challenges are not unique to Wisconsin. Even the Bridge Creek researchers were unable to conduct a follow-up round of restoration due to regulatory hurdles.

“It seems like every state, you have to go through the growing pains of getting people familiar with these approaches,” Bouwes said. “When they see what we’re actually doing — we’re throwing sticks in the stream to slow the water down — they become a lot more comfortable with it.”

Balancing human and beaver needs

By mid-afternoon at Hoffman’s farm, evidence of the day’s construction littered the ground adjacent to the channel where the BDAs stood: empty plastic Powerade bottles, gasoline cans, a chainsaw.

Before getting off work for the day, Nichols and Pennycamp loaded it onto a utility vehicle. Hoffman, meanwhile, browsed through a printout of his state-issued permit, reviewing the details through reading glasses he perched across his nose.

“‘The water is a cool-cold headwater. The proposed dam will not result in significant adverse effects on this resource upon compliance with the conditions in the order,’” he read aloud. “In other words, don’t flood too much, don’t warm the water up too much. Okay, well we’ll debate that later.”

He flipped the page.

The beavers living at Hoffman’s farm are dispersing across the property. One colony chewed down some of his pines and aspens and plugged a culvert, expanding the shoreline as part of a project Hoffman didn’t plan.

It doesn’t bother him because he has more trees to spare and wants to live among the rodents, but he doesn’t begrudge beaver-bothered people. The critters create profound impacts.

Humans and beavers share a common drive to engineer their environment to live. 

“We’ve got to find a way to balance the different needs of each species,” Hoffman said. “You know, us included.”

Why is he doing all this? Permitting, pounding, portage-routing. Really, why bother?

Hoffman’s campaign is more than just a new permitting process. It’s an exhortation to the state 

to reconsider its treatment of beavers. If he can show that mock beaver dams don’t heat the water or block fish, perhaps the state will stop removing beavers and their dams from trout streams.

“We’re going to hopefully show to them that the beavers in the ecosystem are actually beneficial,” Hoffman said.

Going through the trouble is simply part of a kindred ecosystem engineer’s balancing act.

This story is a product of Wisconsin Watch. It was produced in partnership with the Mississippi River Basin Ag & Water Desk with support from the Solutions Journalism Network.

The post An ecosystem engineer’s vision: mock beaver dams to restore Wisconsin wetlands appeared first on MinnPost.