By: Sophia Mora-Ortega, Environmental Policy and Research Intern, Moms Clean Air Force
Date: July 8, 2025
About: Environmental Protection Agency Docket ID No. EPA-HQ-OAR-2025-0124-0001
To: Environmental Protection Agency
Thank you for the opportunity to provide comments today. My name is Sophia Mora-Ortega, and I am an Environmental Policy and Research Intern for Moms Clean Air Force. I strongly oppose efforts to roll back the greenhouse gas emissions standards. The Environmental Protection Agency must not undo critical work by removing climate pollution protections on power plants.
The existing standards that regulate climate pollution from power plants are essential for protecting families from dangerous greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to global warming and put human health at risk. Power plants that burn fossil fuels like coal and natural gas make up about 25% of the climate pollution generated in the United States. The greenhouse gas emissions that these facilities emit contribute significantly to global warming, and every single fraction of a degree of warming matters and must be regulated.
I have lived near the coast my whole life, and having spent most of this time in South Florida, I have seen firsthand the devastating impacts of climate change. With warming oceans, heavier rainfall, and stronger winds, global temperature increase has correlated strongly with more destructive and unpredictable hurricanes that can rapidly increase in intensity. In high school, due to hurricanes, as well the as storm surge we repeatedly experienced from ‘regular’ storms; my football field and its surrounding areas would often flood, forcing schools to close and meaning we had to attend classes online. Yet, I’m one of the luckiest ones. My family’s house and car has not yet been inundated, something I cannot say holds true for many of my neighbors, many of whom have lost their belongings, pets, and even their lives to dangerous flooding.
If regulations on power plants are rolled back, EPA will be sabotaging vital progress and reverting to dangerous practices which jeopardize public health. Already, climate change threatens us in so many ways we cannot risk exacerbating: including but not limited to the presence of more severe heat waves, longer and more intense allergy seasons, more dangerous wildfires, increased risk of Lyme disease and other tick-borne illnesses, and worsened air pollution. As temperatures climb, ground-level ozone forms more easily, triggering asthma attacks and other respiratory conditions, heart attacks, and premature deaths—especially among children, the elderly, and people with preexisting chronic illnesses.
Certain populations bear the heaviest burden of climate impacts. Low-income communities, communities of color, Indigenous populations, people with disabilities, and outdoor workers (such as farmworkers, 80% of whom are Hispanic) are disproportionately and unjustly harmed. Repealing this rule would exacerbate these environmental injustices, compounding health disparities that have persisted for decades.
Through an economic lens, it also makes sense to maintain the existing regulations. According to the EPA itself, the net climate and health benefits of such protections could reach up to 370 billion dollars through 2047. By preserving this rule, we are not only investing in the lives of our children, our most vulnerable neighbors, and future generations, but also we are investing in an economically productive decision.
On so many fronts, it is vital to uphold the protections afforded to us through the Carbon Rule. Repealing the Carbon Rule would not only endanger the planet, it would also strip away critical safeguards that protect families from lethal air pollution and climate-driven disasters.
Once again, I plead the Environmental Protection Agency to not roll back the Carbon Rule. Upholding these protections is essential to ensure that every family in our country can breathe clean air, live in a stable climate, and enjoy a healthy future. Thank you.