Quote of the Day: The Price of Progress

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From the Congressional Research Service, in a report on the cost of new EPA regulations that will shut down some of the worst polluting coal plants in the country:

The costs of the rules may be large, but, in most cases, the benefits are larger.

The full report is here. Brad Plumer has the user-friendly summary here. Bottom line: The cost of the new EPA regs is almost certainly being hugely overestimated by the power industry (surprise!), and the benefits in public health will almost certainly be far greater than the price tag for replacing our most antiquated coal plants — which are mostly near the end of their life anyway — by more efficient combined cycle natural gas plants.

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BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

Mother Jones was founded to do journalism differently. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after stories others don’t. We’re a nonprofit newsroom, because the kind of truth-telling investigations we do doesn’t happen under corporate ownership.

And the essential ingredient that makes all this possible? Readers like you.

It’s reader support that enables Mother Jones to devote the time and resources to report the facts that are too difficult, expensive, or inconvenient for other news outlets to uncover. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

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