Letter: Elect Representatives Who Will Address Climate Change

Climate change falls into the category of “settled science.” It was first proposed prior to 1900 and everything since then has supported its existence. So except for some outliers like Donald Trump, Glenn Thompson and Tom Marino, the issue of whether there is climate change or not isn’t really an issue.

So why are they opposed to such “settled science”, especially after the evidence from this year – again being the hottest on record? The reason is they get money to run their campaigns from companies that benefit from denying climate change.

We already have the evidence of what happens when there is serious climate change. And the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has now predicted that we will see major problems within 20 years. But these deniers are willing to push the change to 2 degrees centigrade through their policies on coal burning and gas mileage on cars. Is it really worth conducting this experiment? We will all pay a heavy price. How can we stop this reckless behavior? One way is to elect Democrats to Congress.

Also, since renewable energy has poor reliability, the source of backup electricity is important. Fossil fuels pollute the planet while nuclear power gives off no CO2. And nuclear is much safer than burning coal that emits many unhealthy byproducts, including smoke. In Pennsylvania 41 percent of electricity comes from nuclear power but some of these reactors may be shut down and replaced by high carbon emission sources. We need to keep the nuclear plants.

Edward H. Klevans