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Election Day is just days away and of all the critical issues at stake, there is one that has a fast-approaching deadline to get a handle on: climate change. If emissions aren’t drastically reduced by 2035, the U.N. warned last week, global climate disaster will be inevitable — but the impacts of climate change are already being felt in daily life in the U.S.
From maternal health and immigration to the cost of food, electricity and insurance, here’s how.
The economy
The economy is top of mind for voters this year, and experts say that climate change has the potential for “significant economic harm.” According to NOAA, the impacts of extreme climate events, including hurricanes, wildfires and floods, are costing the nation an estimated $150 billion every year. The University of Chicago’s Energy Policy Institute finds that climate impacts cost just under 1% of the nation’s GDP for every 1 degree Fahrenheit in temperature change, on average. Even “modest amounts of warming” will hurt the U.S. economy, researchers found.
If the world fails to prevent the rise in global temperatures, one study found that the impacts globally could cost $551 trillion — roughly 19 times the size of the U.S. economy. And while preventing rising temperatures is essential, so is adaptation, with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce finding that just $1 in investment in resilience and disaster preparedness saves $13 in economic costs.
Immigration
Immigration is again a key issue in the 2024 election, but little attention has been paid to what’s causing people to flee their homes. While many often think of crime and conflict as the primary drivers, the Migration Policy Institute has found that it’s actually natural disasters that lead to more displacements worldwide. A 2021 report from the institute found that 6% of migrant families in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras said that climate and environmental-related reasons were why they had to leave their home countries.
It’s not just because of natural disasters destroying homes, but also livelihoods. In Central America, farmers have lost in some cases 70% or more of their crops during harvests because of multiple droughts, Duke University public policy and political science professor Sarah Bermeo told the United States Institute of Peace. She added that droughts were “likely a key driver” of surges in family migrations from Honduras and Guatemala to the U.S. in 2018 and 2019 — and it’s a problem that she and others say will likely only worsen in the coming decades.
In the most pessimistic of scenarios, experts estimate that Latin America will have 17 million climate migrants by 2050, as climate impacts will force migrations across other continents and there continues to be no international legal category for climate refugees.
“Climate change is not the main reason why people move,” the Migration Policy Institute says, “but it is increasingly part of the story.”
Mining
After Hurricane Helene devastated western North Carolina, conspiracy theories arose alleging that the storm was linked to secret government land grabs for mining purposes. Those claims have been proven to be false, but mining and climate change are directly linked.
According to the Advanced Environmental Monitoring Group, extreme weather poses a big problem for mines, including for workers, equipment and mining sites themselves. The group says that flooding and runoff can seep into mine shafts, preventing miners from being able to escape. Lightning is also known to trigger methane gas explosions, the group said.
And when it comes to flooding — made more likely by climate change — coal mines are among the most susceptible to damage. Of the nearly 250 flooding events in U.S. mines from 2000 to 2009, 76% of them were in coal mines, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Today, many mining companies are relying on meteorologists to help create weather plans for their facilities, but as global temperatures rise, that job will likely only become more difficult.
Natural disaster recovery
Hurricane Helene was one of the deadliest storms to ever hit the U.S. mainland when it made landfall more than a month ago, with the storm devastating communities hundreds of miles inland. In North Carolina alone, the damages are historic, costing an estimated $53 billion. Recovery is expected to take years in some places, but as extreme weather intensifies with rising temperatures, it could be delayed even more with repeat events that cost more and more money.
Nearly half of all U.S. homes are facing a severe threat of climate change, with about $22 trillion in residential properties at risk of “severe or extreme damage” from flooding, strong winds, wildfires and more, according to Realtor.com. Many homeowners, however, aren’t financially prepared for the toll of these events and according to FEMA, just 4% of Americans have flood insurance.
Transportation
Transportation isn’t just crucial for getting around on a day-to-day basis, but it’s also essential for key sectors of the economy, including water resources, energy and making goods and services. While most components of U.S. transit were built to withstand weather, they were not designed to withstand the extreme storms and events that the world is experiencing today — and that will only going to get worse in the coming years.
Wildfires, droughts, extreme temperatures and flooding are all straining transportation infrastructure, causing issues from buckled roads to dangling railroads. According to the American Society of Civil Engineers, which grades U.S. infrastructure every four years, U.S. transit has a grade of a “D-,” with experts saying the system is aging and that agencies don’t have enough money for maintenance.
Major upgrades are needed, but so are the actual modes of transportation available, as transportation accounts for over a quarter of global carbon dioxide emissions, which raise global temperatures that contribute to the extreme weather events straining the system.
“The costs of inaction are steep, especially if emissions continue to rise unabated and infrastructure is not adapted to the changing climate,” the EPA says, adding that if changes are not made, it could cost the nation hundreds of billions of dollars of damage per year by 2090.
Fracking
Fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, was one of the most talked about environmental topics this election cycle. The process, which entails extracting natural gas or oil by drilling thousands of feet deep into the ground and injecting a high-pressure mix of water, sand and chemicals into the rock, has been used for decades. Today, it’s used across more than a dozen states, most frequently in Texas and Pennsylvania.
According to the EPA, scientific evidence shows that fracking can lead to chemicals and other dangerous substances leaking into drinking water “under some circumstances.” It’s also been linked to human health issues, with researchers at Yale finding that Pennsylvania children who live near fracking sites at birth are two to three times more likely to be diagnosed with leukemia by the time they’re 7 years old.
Environmental issues also abound, with the U.S. Geological Survey finding that fracking can induce earthquakes. The number of induced earthquakes in the U.S. in the central part of the nation has increased dramatically in the past decade, researchers found, with at least 100 earthquakes of a magnitude 3 or higher every year since 2013.
And when it comes to climate change, fracking can pose a major hindrance in efforts to reduce its impact. Methane, which has 86 times the warming impact of carbon dioxide over a 20-year period, is largely emitted by fracking.
Home insurance
Climate change is making homeownership more expensive. Home insurance premiums, which are meant to be cheaper than the cost of rebuilding your house after a disaster, are increasing across the nation as the rising global temperatures continue to bring a greater risk of floods, severe storms, hurricanes and heat waves. Premiums rose 40% faster than inflation from 2017 to 2022, the Bipartisan Policy Center said this June, causing a “significant burden” for U.S. households.
First Street Foundation, a nonprofit that studies climate risks, found that about 35.6 million properties — a quarter of all real estate in the nation — are facing higher insurance costs, yet lower coverage, because of the risks associated with climate change. Some areas, they found, are “essentially ‘uninsurable.’“
Maternal health and pregnancy
Extreme heat is one of the many potentially deadly impacts of rising global temperatures, but it’s not just something that causes discomfort in the sun. Research has shown that it’s linked to pregnancy complications, including stillbirths and miscarriages, and that the risk for those and other issues is growing.
Those who are pregnant are more susceptible to viruses and environmental conditions. Mosquitoes are known for their ability to transmit viruses, and some of them, like Oropouche virus and Zika virus, can be particularly dangerous for those who are pregnant. As the atmosphere warms, the typical mosquito season is getting longer, extending the risk to vulnerable populations well beyond the usual timeframe.
Numerous studies have also found that preterm births and infant mortality likelihoods rise with the temperature. Expectant mothers have also been found to be at greater risk of conditions with the heat.
“Climate change hurts women more,” doctors at the Association of American Medical Colleges says on its website.
Electricity bills
Choosing between food and paying energy bills is a growing problem in the U.S., a problem known as energy poverty that impacts 5.2 million people who live above the federal poverty line. The price of electricity has already increased 29% since 2019, and that cost is only expected to increase moving forward.
Energy costs are determined by several factors, from heat’s impact on infrastructure to the price of natural gas and more, but it’s the heat that creates a dangerous feedback loop: higher global temperatures fuel extreme weather that increases energy consumption and requires higher costs for maintenance.
Grocery inflation
U.S. food prices have increased 25% since 2019, a side effect of inflation that was only compounded by global disease outbreaks like COVID-19 and conflicts, like the war in Ukraine. But one factor in those rising costs is not expected to go away without substantial action — climate change. The extreme weather events it causes are disrupting farming practices and making it more difficult to grow crops. A 2021 NASA study found that by 2030, global corn yields will likely decline by nearly a quarter because of rising temperatures.
Wisconsin is just one area that will feel the agricultural impacts. The state, which is a major provider of cheese, corn, milk, oats and potatoes, has seen more heat stress on its livestock and crops, according to the USDA. Those impacts include decreased dairy herd milk production and increased crop loss because of cycles of drought and excessive precipitation.
Power infrastructure
Out of all the major U.S. power outages since 2000, Climate Central has found that 80% of them have been because of weather, mostly severe events and winter storms. Rising global temperatures are only expected to make such incidents stronger and more frequent, posing a major problem for U.S. energy infrastructure, which wasn’t designed to withstand the strain.
The American Society of Civil Engineers said in its latest report grading the nation’s infrastructure that this sector received a “C-,” with the organization’s experts saying U.S. energy infrastructure is aged and still being used half a century past its life expectancy. That age, combined with the increasing extreme weather events, could cost businesses about $150 billion a year. Blackouts pose additional dangers to human health, including blocking access to food and water, communication and emergency health care.
