EPA Clean Power Plan Public Hearing 

EPA, Washington, DC, July 29,2014 

Presented by Joe Cook, Resident ofNorfolk, VA 23508, Clean Energy Chair, Sierra Club CBG 

My name is Joe Cook, a residential homeowner in Norfolk, VA, and Clean Energy Chair for the Sierra Club's 

Chesapeake Bay Group. I come today to speak out strongly in favor of the EPA's Clean Power Plan and urge 

its adoption with amendments to benefit the people and the planet. To that end, I advocate that the EPA 

accelerate the timetable from 2030 to 2020 for reaching not just a 30% but a 35 - 40% reduction below 2005 

carbon pollution levels. This proposal will better protect public health, move the United States toward a cleaner 

environment and fight climate change while supplying Americans with reliable and affordable power. 

I want to speak to you from a personal perspective as one who lives in a coastal area already at risk of flooding 

from sea level rise and severe weather events. Both of these factors are linked to climate change and global 

warming, largely caused by carbon pollution from existing dirty, fossil fuel burning power plants. One such 

coal fired plant, operates just 12 miles from my home and belches soot and aerosols of mercury, arsenic, 

chromium, nickel, sodium dioxide and nitrogen oxides, pollution that adversely affects my health. It 

contributes to my suffering from sinusitis and a lupus compromised immune system. Carbon pollution from the 

over 1, 100 currently unregulated coal power plants like the one nearby threatens communities across the nation, 

especially high risk coastal cities like Norfolk. Those plants and the poisonous toxins spewed from their smoke 

stacks cost taxpayers billions of dollars each year by worsening climate disruption, increasing health care costs 

and causing premature deaths, none of which are factored into the cost per kilowatt hour. 

A Feb. 2011 report, "Mining Coal, Mounting Costs: the Life Cycle Consequences of Coal was led by 

associate director of the Center for Health and the GlobaJ Environment at Harvard Medical School Dr. Paul 

Epstein. The report found that accounting for the full costs of coal power would double or triple its price from 

12¢/k:wh to 24- 36¢/kwh, which makes it more costly than wind, solar or geothermal. The study, released in the 

Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, tallied the economic~ health and environmental costs associated 

with each stage in the life cycle of coal - extraction, transportation, processing, and combustion - and estimated 

those costs borne by the public at large may reach $500 billion dollars annually. 1 

Reducing carbon pollution from power plants will not only save billions of dollars each year, it will save lives. 

In fact, for every dollar of investment under the Plan, we'll see roughly seven dollars in health benefits. The 

plan will spur innovation, accelerate the clean energy economy, and create American jobs. Just the build-out of 

Virginia's offshore wind industry could produce over 10,000 good, local, high-paying jobs. According to the 

Department of Energy, the potential offshore wind resource off the lower 48 states exceeds the country's entire 

electricity demand. Developing all of that area would add tens of thousands of more jobs. 

Therefore, I and the Sierra Club urge adoption of the EPA Clean Power Plan at an accelerated pace, while 

strengthening it in three attainable ways: 

1) Bigger Carbon Pollution Reductions. Transition from dirty to clean energy faster than EPA predicts at a 

higher emission reduction goal of35-40% below 20051evels by 2020 instead of2030. 

2) Renewables and Energy Efficiency. Virginia can meet the new standards through renewable energy and 

efficiency, the fastest, cleanest, and most cost-effective path without increasing our use of dirty and dangerous 

energy sources like nuclear or natural gas. 

3) Empower Affected Workers & Communities. Ensure that affected communities are engaged throughout the 

process, and that public resources are available to help workers and communities as they make the transition to 

a clean energy economy. 

Let's move beyond coal to a clean energy economy, while saving lives, money and Mother Earth from 

catastrophe. 

Climate Progress, 

Feb. 16,2011.