7/31/14 EPA Hearing- Clean Power Plan- Pittsburgh, PA 

John D. Bechtel Jr. 3817 Darby Road, Harrisburg, PA 17109-4835 

Tel: (717) 541-1447 Email: banskho9@gmail.com 

Good morning/afternoon: 

My name is John Bechtel. I'm 66 years old, retired, and live in Harrisburg. I'm an active member in two 

environmental groups. One is secular, one is faith-based, and both work hard for the cause of clean air 

in Pennsylvania. But I will speak in my own voice today, and I'd like to do that by first telling you a short 

story from my personal life. It's a sort of metaphor for why I put so much time into the climate change 

movement. 

A few years ago, when I was still teaching a 4th grade Sunday School class, one of the kid's parents, an 

active duty Army Sergeant, gave me what was for him an urgent call. It had nothing to do with Sunday 

School or his 4th grader, for she was away on a church mission trip with his wife at the time. Rather it 

was about the urgent need to put his family's living quarters on the military base into spic n span shape 

ASAP. The departure date for his next post-of-duty in Hawaii was closing in fast. But with his wife and 

daughter out of town and unable to help, he had fallen behind schedule with the clean-up work, and 

needed to catch up fast. 

As I swept, dusted, and scrubbed alongside my friend on that Saturday, it slowly dawned on me that his 

all-out effort was motivated in large part by what you might call a "Code of Honor" among military 

families. You have a duty to those who follow you. You owe it to that next family to restore your living 

quarters to tip-top shape before you go on to that next post-of-duty. 

I can't say where I'll go for my next "post-of-duty". Unless I clean up my act soon, it may look and feel a 

lot more like God's idea of Afghanistan than Hawaii. And while this story may work well enough for me, 

it's actually a very poor metaphor for the gravity of the threat of climate change, which goes far beyond 

the threat that soot, ash, and trash pose to our environment and our health. But as long as I'm still 

around, I'll do my part to restore our corner of "Mother Earth" to somewhat the same shape as I found 

Her, upon my arrival in 1948. That's what I feel is the duty I owe to those who will follow. 

And that's why I pray that you will put in place, monitor, and above all enforce a strong Clean Power 

Plan to limit industrial carbon pollution from coal-fired power plants. The science is settled. Climate 

change driven by global warming poses an existential threat to Americans. We have a sacred duty to 

leave our children with a safe climate. But like my friend in the story, we are falling behind schedule on 

our clean-up job, and we need to catch up fast. Carbon emissions are the primary cause of global 

warming, and coal-fired power plants are the primary cause of carbon emissions in the USA. Your Clean 

Power Plan is a great start. But please press on, and ensure that it is only the beginning of our 

honorable clean-up job. For it's fair to say that the entire world will be watching very closely, to see 

how well we do. And something tells me that God will be, too. 

Thank you very much for the opportunity to speak to you today.