Climate Change

Floor Speech

Mr. ELLISON. Mr. Speaker, I want to talk today about important issues involving climate change going on all over America, all over this world. But specifically today, I want to talk about our urban communities. Global warming is expected to increase the frequency and intensity of natural disasters, like wildfires in the West and hurricanes like Sandy on the east coast, and record drought conditions that continue for another year across the Midwest.

But in urban areas, cities like D.C., or my hometown of Minneapolis, we have something known as an urban heat island. Urban heat islands are a serious problem because urban areas tend to have temperatures 5-20 degrees warmer than rural areas, which is known as heat island effect. Heat islands are caused by a lack of natural vegetation, dark colored, impervious roads and concrete, and exhaust from vehicles and industry. As global temperatures increase, urban areas are warming at double the rate of the average global temperature, so this is a real serious issue.

Heat islands drive people to increase their use of air conditioning, which of course has a vicious effect in terms of just increasing an already serious problem. In turn, increasing the air conditioning drives up energy costs and increases power plant emissions, which contributes to the heat island in the first place.

These emissions not only contribute to global warming, they impact human health, increase emissions of carbon monoxide, mercury, and particulate matter, which leads to increased risks of heart attacks, strokes, and asthma. Particulate matter is very fine pieces that are emitted from coal plants. They go up into the air and come down, and we breathe that stuff in.

The effect of extreme heat in urban areas disproportionately affects some Americans as opposed to others. It affects anyone who lives in an urban area. But given the populations of urban areas, it affects certain communities more, including communities of color, low-income communities, and the elderly.

This housing segregation that we have in our country in which you have this disproportionate number of some populations in urban areas, concentrates racial ethnic minorities in dense environments, and that's why we see African Americans experiencing some of these heat-related hazards that have to do with everything from asthma and other sorts of issues like that. The low-income, minority, and elderly are less able to adapt and recover from these extreme climate events and are the communities most at risk from heat island effects and heat waves.

These communities are already plagued by higher pollution than wealthy, white communities. Coal plants, bus depots, and trash incinerators are disproportionately located in these areas that I speak of, and the heat island effect makes it worse.

The high cost of air conditioning, the inability to move into special heat wave shelters increases risk. Urban minorities often have more underlying health issues, such as higher rates of asthma, as I mentioned before, which also creates susceptibility to increased pollutants in these heat islands.

In 1995, a Chicago heat wave killed more than 700 people over 5 days, mostly elderly people who couldn't escape. The European heat wave in 2003 killed 30,000 people, although some estimates put that number as high as 70,000. Socioeconomic disparities will worsen through the health and economic effects of climate change.

As global temperatures continue to rise, heat waves in urban areas are increasing in frequency, duration, and intensity; and the effect on my community of Minneapolis, and urban areas all over this country, will be devastating. This is a serious issue that we need to focus on. We need to do something about it. The time is now.

I want to thank the Safe Climate Caucus for organizing Members to discuss this issue for the public today so we can all come to a greater level of awareness about the true dangers of ignoring global climate change.

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