CFACT collegians from Denver University were on the front lines yesterday, speaking out against Obama’s Clean Power Plan at the EPA Public Hearing in Denver on the initiative.
Student Morris Sparkman led the charge, lining out how the CPP would hurt his generation’s chances of landing a job and moving out of their parents’ homes, all while doing nothing to affect global temperatures.
Read the convincing argument he made to EPA officials here:
Clean Power Plan: Endangering Future Generations
Testimony for the Clean Power Plan EPA Hearing on Tuesday, November 17, 2015
-Morris Sparkman
Thank you very much for the opportunity to speak this afternoon. I am a student at Denver University and involved with Collegians For A Constructive Tomorrow, a national student based non-profit that focuses on environmental issues.
As students, my peers and I are always doing everything we can to prepare for our careers after school. We study hard, play hard on our sports teams, and work hard in our part time jobs and internships. I testify in opposition to the Clean Power Plan, because it will reduce the chances of all our hard work paying off.
The CPP will increase energy costs for all Americans, but will hit low and middle income Americans hardest. It will also make it harder for recent graduates, like I intend to be one day, from making ends meet on our own and moving out of our parents’ homes. With almost all of us dealing with heavy student loans, the last thing we need is that monthly utility bill removing our ability to save up a few bucks at the end of the month.
The EPA claims more taxpayer-financed energy subsidies will help the poorest families. What about everyone else? The President and many others say that becoming more reliant on renewable energy is about future generations. But if the only way our least fortunate can afford the CPP is with subsidies, thus increasing our historically high debt, then the CPP is only hurting future generations, like myself, who will have to pay for these bills down the line. Those checks you are writing now will have to be cashed by my generation.
Others argue that whatever the cost, whatever the burden, it is worth it to preserve the planet. However, according to climatologist Judith Curry from Georgia Tech, this plan will prevent less than 0.03 degrees F of global warming 85 years from now.
According to CFACT’s research, states that rely on coal to heat and power their homes currently pay 8-9 cents per kilowatt-hour. Green energy states like California pay 15-17 cents/kWh, while renewable heavy Germany and Denmark pay 36-40 cents/kWh. Whether one thinks it is worth the cost or not, it is clear that plans like this will make it harder to pay those electricity bills.
At least twelve states will have to impose 40-48% reductions in emissions. Those states now get 50-96% of their electricity from coal, and nearly all their electricity from coal plus natural gas. But under the CPP, even power plants running on natural gas that replace coal plants would not be counted as renewable.
When those energy bills become harder to pay, employers have less wiggle room in their budgets to hire recent graduates. Energy bills affect every sector of the economy.
It will not just be a specific major of study that is affected by this. It will impact all students. I ask that you do not make the difficult task of landing a job any more difficult than it already is for us.
Again, I ask on behalf of CFACT’s students nationwide, and on behalf of my generation, to reconsider this plan and the impact it will have on us through the job market and future debt, in exchange for no progress in reducing global temperatures.
Thank you.