STATEMENT TO THE EPA JULY 30, 2014

I am the Rev. Dr. Barbara Schlachter, an Episcopal priest from lowa and I speak in
favor of the Clean Power Plan.

lowa has experienced the effects of climate change dramatically in the last six years, starting with the floods of 2008 and continuing with alternating drought and flood. This has wreaked havoc on agriculture in many parts of the state. When I left lowa to come here to testify, we still had areas of lowa City inaccessible because of flood waters that peaked over a month ago.

I speak as an Episcopal priest and also a founder of 100Grannies for a Livable Future. We are a group of older women who are concerned about the kind of world our grandchildren, indeed everyone's children and grandchildren, will have to live in. We are over a hundred strong. We refer to ourselves as "fossils for a fossil fuel free future," and we have a funny picture of a group of us like aging Rockettes getting off our rockers and getting out and active about the issue of global warming.

At our meeting this past week we shared what places we love that are already being impacted by climate change. I spoke about what is happening to my beloved beach on Lake Erie where my family has lived for over a hundred years and yet my grandchildren may not be able to swim there because of algal bloom, run-off, and erosion exacerbated by climate change. One woman spoke of visiting her children and grandchildren in Colorado where the pine beetles have killed trees because it wasn't cold enough to kill them, leaving the trees as tinder for forest fires and threatening her family. Another woman spoke of growing up in lowa City and riding her bike in City Park. She is still doing it, but the park is officially closed because of flooding. We all have places that we mourn, in this country and around the world.
Also this past week during the Johnson County Fair many of the Grannies braved the heat and took a shift at a booth to talk to people about the reality and danger of the climate crisis and what they can do as ordinary citizens. While we havepledged to live more simply with less impact on the earth, we know that it has to

be a larger, corporate business, and government solution.

The Episcopal Church passed a resolution in 2009 urging President Obama and Congressional leaders to commit the US to a course of action to lower the output of atmospheric carbon by 25% by 2020 and by 80% by 2050. This is even more ambitious than the Clean Power Plan and it is in the camp of those who say that the Clean Power Plan doesn't go far enough soon enough. Yet the Clean Power Plan is a first step and an extremely important one.

As one of the Grannies who teaches biology at a nearby college reminded me, "regulation of air and water pollution through the EPA is the only policy that has a
successful track record."

Others at this hearing can speak from a scientific perspective on why it is necessary to reduce carbon emissions so that the earth's temperature does not rise more than 2 degrees Celsious.

I speak from a moral perspective that comes from being an Episcopal priest from the earliest days that women were ordained. I have been a student of scripture, history, and human nature and above all a person of prayer. Most recently I have become a student of climate justice issues. I have concluded that the climate crisis is the defining moral issue of our time and is the scientific realty that exacerbates all social and health problems, and aggravates many o 

### ~ the conflict zones around the world. It is the poor that suffer the most, whether it is poor nations or poor people. This is happening as we speak today.

As a person of Biblical faith 1 believe we are entrusted with the care of the earth, and we are co-creators with the ultimate source and destiny many of us call God. How can we claim the right to deny a stable climate, a life-giving earth, to future generations? Now that we know the consequences of our fossil fuel addiction and we know ways to ameliorate and change our energy sources, how can we refuse to do so? How can we deny those who come after, even if it is inconvenient and perhaps economically expensive in the short term?As a person of Biblical faith, I not only believe at looking at tough reality and hard

questions directly, I also believe there are reasons #or hope. We humans are ingenious; we have created the mess we are in. And 

## we are resourcefu.l. We can do amazing things when we have to—like niabiiizL-a country overnight to fight a world war. And deep down we have caring hearts that when given the choice between life and death for millions, we choose-life. By adopting the Clean Power Plan, our nation is saying yes to life, yes to the care of creation, its creatures, and all of the earth's people.

Thank you.

The Rev. Dr. Barbara H. Schlachter 7 Glenview Knoll NE lowa City IA 52240 319-351-4380