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Wisconsin needs to step it up and hold major climate polluters responsible for the damage they have caused. Fossil fuel corporations are polluting our world at the public’s expense, causing increasingly frequent climate disasters. The U.S. government provides an estimated $29.4 billion a year in direct subsidies, according to the Center for American Progress, a liberal-leaning think tank. While oil companies are gobbling up taxpayer money, the public is footing the bill for disaster cleanup. The good news is that there is a straightforward fix. Wisconsin can follow Vermont and New York’s lead by making the polluters pay. 

Vermont and New York have already created climate superfunds, which hold polluters accountable for their share in the billions of dollars in damages climate change is causing. These funds are accounts into which fossil fuel companies must pay, with the money used to help communities become more resilient to climate change.

The number of billion-dollar weather and climate disasters continues to grow in the U.S., with 23 occurring in just last year, according to Climate Central, a nonprofit organization that researches and reports facts about the changing climate. These disasters are not only happening in the South. They are right here in the Midwest. Wisconsin has been battered by an increasing number of extreme climate events in recent years. From tornadoes to hailstorms, it feels as though Wisconsin cannot catch a break. In April, another devastating hailstorm hit the east side of Madison and damaged hundreds of homes and cars with its baseball-sized hail.

Wisconsinites need to talk to their representatives and let them know that they are fed up with paying for climate-disaster-related damages while the fossil fuel companies earn record profits. The state needs resources to prepare for future climate disasters, and a Wisconsin climate superfund would fill that need. Please urge your state representatives to make polluters pay for climate damages.

Leo Rain is a Madison resident and member of the Madison chapter of Climate Changemakers, which describes itself as a “modern climate advocacy program built for busy, productive people who are looking for meaningful civic engagement.”

Guest opinion: Wisconsin should make polluters pay is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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Climate researchers predict storms that produce golf ball-size or larger hail will become more frequent, thanks to climate change.

According to a 2024 study by Northern Illinois University, a warmer climate increases water vapor in the air, which provides energy for thunderstorms like those seen April 14, 2026, in Wisconsin that produced large hail.

Hail is created when strong updrafts of air are pushed up into the colder atmosphere, freezing water droplets and pushing them around, making the droplets bigger and bigger. Eventually, those hailstones get too heavy and fall to earth. 

“Our study suggests golf ball-size hail or larger will become more common because of more atmospheric instability, which leads to stronger thunderstorm updrafts,” NIU Atmospheric Science Professor Victor Gensini said.

A 2017 study in Nature that looked at historic patterns and forecasts also found hailstone size is expected to increase due to climate change.

This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.

Sources

• Nature journal Climate and Atmospheric Science: Hailstone size dichotomy in a warming climate
• Nature Climate Change: The changing hail threat over North America in response to anthropogenic climate change
• Accuweather: Is climate change making hailstones larger?
• BBC: How climate change is leading to bigger hailstones

Is golf ball-sized hail expected to increase due to climate change? is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.