Sierra Club Submits 115,000 Comments Demanding Clean Power Plan Stay in Place

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Sierra Club and its allies submitted more than 115 thousand comments today demanding scandal ridden EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt leave the Clean Power Plan in place. The Clean Power Plan will protect the health of millions of families and communities by curbing dangerous, climate-disrupting carbon pollution that is exacerbating extreme weather events, and also reduces other harmful pollutants that can cause heart attacks, severe respiratory illnesses, and even premature deaths.

EPA projected that the widely supported Clean Power Plan would prevent 90,000 childhood asthma attacks, 300,000 missed work and school days, and 3,600 premature deaths annually by 2030. The Clean Power Plan would result in annual climate benefits of $20 billion and annual health benefits of between $14 and $34 billion. It would also reduce the average consumer’s electricity bill by $85 per year and save consumers a total of $155 billion over the course of the next decade.

In addition to saving electricity customers money, protecting our climate, and reducing air pollution, the Clean Power Plan also included numerous provisions for environmental justice programs and products that would have addressed significant equality gaps between affluent, white communities and low income communities and people of color.

In response, Liz Perera, Sierra Club’s Climate Policy Director, released the following statement:

“The Clean Power Plan is an historic policy that will not only help combat the worst impacts of climate change and reduce dangerous air pollution, it’s a vitally important tool for reversing decades of environmental racism and classism that has historically hurt low income communities and communities of color. That’s why more than 115,000 Americans shouted in one strong voice today that Scott Pruitt must keep it in place.

“America’s transition to a clean energy economy is already in full swing and the Clean Power Plan will help supercharge and guide it using the principles of equity and justice. Scott Pruitt’s attempts to recklessly withdraw from the Clean Power Plan will only hurt the people already struggling with pollution from fossil fuel plants, and who are most at risk to disastrous climate disruption. Pruitt must keep the Clean Power Plan in place, not protect polluters’ profits.”