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The latest on the Key Bridge collapse, New York puts forth legislation to get clean energy projects on the grid and Wisconsin and other states join a federal summer food program to help feed kids across the country.

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Republicans float conspiracy theories on the collapse of Baltimore's Key Bridge, South Carolina's congressional elections will use a map ruled unconstitutional, and the Senate schedules an impeachment trial for Homeland Secretary Mayorkas.

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Historic wildfires could create housing and health issues for rural Texans, a Kentucky program helps prison parolees start a new life, and descendants of Nicodemus, Kansas celebrate the Black settlers who journeyed across the 1870s plains seeking self-governance.

Colorado Senate to Consider Putting Brakes on Clean Power Plan

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Wednesday, March 16, 2016   

DENVER - A new effort to block the Environmental Protection Agency's Clean Power Plan will be heard Thursday in the Colorado Senate's Agriculture, Natural Resources and Energy Committee. If passed, Senate Bill 46 would put a two-year hold on the state's planning efforts to reduce climate pollution from coal-fired power plants.

Tyler Svitak, director of air quality and transportation for the American Lung Association, which opposes the legislation, said delaying action would be bad for public health.

"The impacts of air quality affect the most vulnerable populations in the state, including about 108,000 children that have asthma," Svitak said. "Any delay that we make in developing our plans, all of Coloradans are put at risk."

According to Clean Power Plan projections, cutting carbon emissions would mean 90,000 fewer asthma attacks in children and 3,600 fewer premature deaths nationally by 2030. The bill's sponsor, Sen. John Cooke, R-Greeley, and other critics have maintained that the plan could lead to higher energy costs and job loss.

The EPA has estimated that when the plan is fully implemented, electric bills actually would go down and public-health and climate-related benefits could add up to almost $54 billion a year. Svitak argued that long-term health gains outweigh any short-term costs of transitioning to cleaner energy.

"It is a health issue," Svitak said. "People live around these coal-fired power plants. In Colorado Springs, in north Denver, there are power plants that are very close to where people work and live and play."

SB 46 also states that if the Clean Power Plan is ruled to be invalid, Colorado's plan to cut emissions would be automatically terminated. Last month the U.S. Supreme Court issued a temporary stay on the new rules in response to a lawsuit filed by industry groups and states, including Colorado, with close ties to fossil-fuel production.

The text of SB 46 is online at leg.state.co.us. The Clean Power Plan is online at epa.gov.


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