This summer, corporate polluters and their lobbyists succeeded in stalling Senate legislation on clean energy and climate. Now the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) seeks to move forward on the agency’s top priority of enforcing commonsense safeguards to protect public health, such as the Clean Air Act.
Over the next few months, the following are a number of environmental safeguards that we must act to protect:
• The good-neighbor rule, which could help avoid at least 23,000 heart attacks, 240,00 asthma attacks and 36,000 premature deaths from polluted air each year;
• The smog, or ozone, rule, which could prevent more than 5,000 heart attacks and up to 12,000 premature deaths annually;
• The coal-ash rule, which could keep known carcinogens from toxic coal leftovers out of our water.
These safeguards use science to prevent premature deaths, heart attacks and cancer, but dirty industries are set on blocking them.
Our country must clear the way for the EPA to set the strongest possible standards to protect our public health and welfare. Please, let’s not go backward. We must hold corporate polluters accountable and speed the transition to a clean-energy economy.
Elaine Long East Brunswick