Bill Denying Climate Change Moves Ahead
Several years ago naturalist David Attenborough called climate change “the biggest threat to security that modern humans have ever faced.” Today a three-person House subcommittee spent all of four minutes debating House Study Bill 67, which would ostensibly kill all consideration of climate change in state decision making.
The bill eliminates language in Iowa Code directing the state to work on efforts to reduce reliance on petroleum and fossil fuels and prohibits the Iowa Utilities Board from considering climate change in the granting of pipeline and underground storage facility permits.
Pam Mackey-Taylor of the Iowa chapter of Sierra Club spoke against the bill. She said the Iowa Utilities board “…should be able to consider a whole range, a whole host, of issues…including climate change.” She also said that the Utilities Board should discuss and consider climate change if an applicant mentions it in their application.
Rep. Adam Zabner of Iowa City, one of the subcommittee members, stated that the Iowa Department of Natural Resources has a list of negative impacts Iowa is already seeing due to climate change, including increased precipitation, higher temperatures, skyrocketing homeowners insurance, habitat changes, and agricultural challenges.
“This is not the time to pull back on our actions, particularly when we are talking about 30 and 50 year projects,” emphasized Rep. Zabner. Rep. Judd Lawler of Oxford and Rep. Charlie Thomson of Charles City both voted to advance the bill to the full House Commerce Committee for what Rep. Thomson called “a more fulsome discussion.”
LWVIA is registered opposed.