Maine is especially vulnerable to the effects of climate change, which could have devastating impacts on our lobster, ski, foliage, and other nature-based industries. Our coastal communities—vital to our tourism economy—are threatened by increasingly severe storms and sea-level rise. Scientists agree that climate change is causing increased insect-borne illnesses, such as Lyme disease, and our reliance on dirty energy sources, including oil and coal, contributes to high asthma rates in Maine children and contamination of our lakes, rivers, and streams, and the wildlife that depend on them.
Federal clean energy policies would result in a safer, healthier environment for Maine people. Investing in clean energy and energy efficiency could also mean thousands more good-paying jobs for Maine workers.
With the failure of Congress to take bold climate action, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) under President Obama began pressing forward with pollution limits as required by the Clean Air Act. In 2015, the EPA proposed the Clean Power Plan to put the first ever limits on climate-changing carbon pollution from power plants. We’ve limited smog, soot, mercury, and other pollutants, but never the carbon pollution putting our climate at dire risk.
The Natural Resources Council of Maine is leading a collaborative effort to build support for and defend this proposal against the Trump Administration’s attempts to undermine its effectiveness. Tens of thousands of Mainers, hundreds of Maine businesses—and scores of other organizations—support the Clean Power Plan and have called on our Senators to show leadership in supporting and defending the plan when it is attacked by polluters.
Facts about Climate Change and Its Effects on:
Maine can be a leader in creating jobs in efficiency and clean energy research and development. We can also benefit by wisely harnessing our natural sources of clean, renewable energy. The EPA’s Clean Power Plan recognizes the leadership already shown by Maine and the region by putting our own strict limits on carbon pollution from power plants through the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. Now it’s time for the entire country to be taking some of the steps on climate we’ve already begun.
The Trump Administration and Congress are attacking federal protections to limit climate-changing carbon pollution, so NRCM is fighting back. Visit our Climate and Clean Energy pages to see what we’re doing here in state:
