Electricity Security and Affordability Act
Floor Speech
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Mr. PETERS of California. I thank the gentleman.
Mr. Chairman, proponents of this bill are arguing, in part, that EPA's plan to require carbon pollution controls under section 111 is going to hurt electric utilities. But it was just last month in the Utility Air Regulation Group v. EPA case that those same leading utilities argued to the Supreme Court that if EPA intends to address climate carbon pollution, it should act under section 111, which is what this bill would prevent EPA from doing.
The Utility Air Regulatory Group represents about 60 utilities, from Duke Energy, the Southern Company, FirstEnergy, to the Salt River Project. On February 24, they told the Supreme Court that this was the appropriate way for EPA to address carbon pollution from utilities under section 111. That is exactly what the EPA would do, if it were not for this law.
I know there may be some ideological desire to deny climate change and simply hope that the issue goes away, but that is not going to happen.
More fundamentally, what we are getting caught up in today is this false choice that you hear over and over again that you have to choose, on one hand, between a healthy environment and, on the other hand, a prosperous economy. Americans deserve nothing less than both. We have to pay attention to this.
I just offer comments from some of our leading health organizations--the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American College of Preventive Medicine, the American Lung Association, the American Public Health Association, and others--who point out:
Cleaning up carbon pollution and other greenhouse gases saves lives. Researchers found that efforts enacted now to reduce greenhouse gases, including carbon pollution from all sources in the United States, would prevent more than 16,000 premature deaths by 2030. The lives saved are a result of a reductions in the ozone- and particulate-forming pollution that is also reduced as carbon is reduced. Cleaning up carbon pollution from power plants is essential to saving those lives.
We know, in turn, that will save money.
So it is important to remember, too, the economic effect of unregulated carbon does not just extend to the climate but also to the by-products of clean air that come and help our economy and help people be healthy and ultimately contribute to the economy.
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