Last week, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released a final announcement repealing life-saving protections on mercury, heavy metals, and other hazardous pollutants emitted from coal-fired power plants. The pollution safeguards provided under the Mercury and Air Toxics Standard have successfully protected children across the United States from mercury-related developmental delays and other health harms. Now, the EPA’s recent ruling threatens to reverse these crucial gains. In response, EEN President and CEO Dr. Rev. Jessica Moerman released the following statement.

Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released its final rule to repeal a more than decade-old decision known as the “endangerment finding,” which legally concludes that greenhouse gas emissions threaten human health and welfare by causing climate change. The final repeal does not challenge the medical research, which firmly establishes that greenhouse gases pose a threat to human health, but instead questions its own authority to limit carbon pollution, which has been granted by Congress and affirmed by the Supreme Court. In response, Kim Anderson, Director of Member Mobilization for the Evangelical Environmental Network, released the following statement regarding the implications for Pennsylvania.

Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released its final rule to repeal a more than decade-old decision known as the “endangerment finding,” which legally concludes that greenhouse gas emissions threaten human health and welfare by causing climate change. The final repeal does not challenge the medical research, which firmly establishes that greenhouse gases pose a threat to human health, but instead questions its own authority to limit carbon pollution, which has been granted by Congress and affirmed by the Supreme Court. In response to this rule, Dr. Rev. Jessica Moerman, EEN’s President and CEO, released the following statement.