The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has announced its intent to overturn and undo decades of bipartisan consensus on critical pollution safeguards that have resulted in cleaner air and water and significant health improvements for our communities. The announcements cover 31 pollution protections, including standards on mercury, soot, and traffic pollution as well as the reconsideration of a decade-old, evidence-based conclusion that carbon dioxide, methane, and four other climate-warming pollutants endanger human health and welfare.
In response to these announcements, YECA National Organizer & Spokesperson Lauren Kim issued the following statement:
As evangelical Christians, YECA takes seriously our call to defend God’s creation for the sake of the wellbeing of all communities. The EPA has a similar mission to protect human health and the environment. Both Republican and Democratic administrations have advanced this goal in the last five decades and saved millions of American lives through the EPA.
Pollution safeguards are an important step in providing environmental justice to the American people. Safe air to breathe, clean water to drink, and carcinogenic free environments further our quality of life and fulfil our mandates of responsible stewardship. Past pollution safeguards, which YECA has advocated for, have reduced levels of soot (PM2.5), methane, carbon in our power sector, and NOx emissions in both heavy and light duty vehicles.
YECA is dismayed to hear about plans to eliminate these successful and cost-effective pollution safeguards. This “pollution-first” agenda will result in the waste of taxpayer dollars on lengthy litigation and will ultimately fail to pass an evidence-based process. Current standards are projected to save $85B in health and climate benefits. The results of these attempted rollbacks include cancer related deaths, asthma, preterm births, and dangerous extreme weather. These proposed cuts will affect a third of the American population who currently breathe unhealthy air. Particularly concerning is pollution's disproportionate effects on vulnerable communities.
EPA’s announced plan fails its core mission and ignores its public responsibility for the health of the American people. We encourage the EPA to keep its focus on furthering mission-critical work to protect human health and the environment instead of undoing successes that have made America safer.
Young Christians, please join us in taking action to stand up for our neighbors here. These standards are vital and life-saving actions which serve our friends, families, and children everywhere.
