5 ways President Obama's new carbon emissions plan could improve your life

Each year we spew 20 times more carbon into the air than our planet can remove. Atmospheric scientists have warned that, in order to get Earth back to healthy carbon dioxide (CO₂) levels, humankind needs to cut those emissions by a whopping 98% - a seemingly impossible feat.

That isn't stopping Barack Obama's presidential administration from taking a stab at the problem, though.

The White House released a video on August 3 about President Obama's final plan to cut 32% of greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel-fired power plants by 2030.

The new EPA-backed regulations are part of the Clean Air Act, and they outline the first federal limits on carbon emissions that coal-, oil-, and gas-fired plants can expel. (All US states have to submit plans to meet the new regulations by Sept. 6, 2018.) According to the Associated Press, the goal of a 32% cut in CO₂ emissions in 15 years is an even stiffer regulation than his original plan, which called for a 30% cut. The Obama administration is referring to this as "the biggest, most important step we've ever taken to combat climate change."

Here are a few ways reining in carbon emissions could improve our lives.