Testimony to the EPA 

Denver, Colorado 

July 29, 2014 

I would like to begin by thanking you for the opportunity to testify today on such a farreaching and important matter. My name is Jim White and I am here today as both a 

person of science and a person of faith testifying on behalf of Lutheran Advocacy 

Ministry-Colorado, a ministry of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. I am a full 

professor at the University of Colorado, Boulder and have spent my 30-year research 

career studying past climates using ice cores, the workings of world's large ice sheets, 

and the carbon cycle. I have authored over 150 peer-reviewed publications and am a 

Highly Cited author (top one-half of one percent of all authors) in my field. I have 

chaired committees for the National Academy of Sciences as well as the Lutheran 

Campus Ministry. 

Our planet's climate is changing, and humans are driving those changes by the release of 

vast amounts of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. The physics behind the link 

between greenhouses and climate are simple, as are the physics behind the links between 

a warmer climate and much higher sea levels and a drier west, to name but two 

repercussions. We in the west will suffer from water shortages and we cannot afford that. 

In the coming decades and centuries, low lying coastal cities like Miami will be 

abandoned to the sea, creating lasting, ironic monuments to our inaction. 

But at its core, climate change is a moral issue, and it is to this that I wish to speak. The 

first moral issue is how we treat our children. We live on a water planet, and again simple 

physics tells us that it will take decades for the ocean to warm and fully express the 

climate that goes with our current, high levels of greenhouse gases. This creates an 

intergenerational inequity. What we do, our children will have to deal with, and what 

they do, their children will have to deal with, and so forth. We all say that we love our 

kids. But how do we truly show it? Until one generation can set aside the lure of shortterm gains for the long-term profit of our children, the cycle will never be broken. We 

need to express our love for our children in the very tangible way that the Clean Power 

Plan provides. A second moral issue to consider is the disproportional impact that climate 

change has on the poor, both internationally and here in the US. Poorer nations and 

poorer people have less capability to adapt to issues such as sea level rise, access to clean 

water, and access to secure food supplies, as well as dealing with obvious problems such 

as heat waves and droughts. How do we, the rich, square this with our ethical obligation 

to those in need? Christ was clear: "...whatever you did not do for one of the least of 

these, you did not do for me." 

Our relationship with the planet itself also clearly presents a moral problem for us. We 

are charged with the stewardship of God's creation, and so must always be asking 

ourselves: are we good stewards? The facts say that while we try, we come up short, and 

must face those shortcomings. Species extinctions are rising rapidly around the globe. 

Every species has its place in God's beautiful mosaic that we call our environment. A lost 

species is lost forever, and we must be held accountable for every species that we force 
into extinction by our actions, or inactions. If we will not hold ourselves accountable, 

surely God will. 

The proposed Clean Power Plan will not fully address the problems that create the moral 

struggles we now face. But these regulations are a start, a start that is achievable and 

promises to break the current stranglehold that keeps us from facing reality as well as our 

obligations to our fellow humans and the planet. As a final thought let us consider the 

considerable positive benefits of the Clean Power Plan. By taking action we show our 

love for children and grandchildren, we care for those in need, and we care for God's 

creation that He has lovingly provided for us. Not bad outcomes for doing the right thing. 

So lets do it.