A federal judge on Monday threw out a closely watched lawsuit filed by two California cities against fossil-fuel companies over the costs of dealing with climate change. The decision is a stinging defeat for the plaintiffs, San Francisco and Oakland, and raises warning flags for other local governments around the United States that have filed similar suits, including New York City.
The judge, William Alsup of U.S. District Court in San Francisco, acknowledged the science of global warming and the great risks to the planet, as did the oil and gas companies being sued. But in his ruling, Alsup said the courts were not the proper place to deal with such global issues, and he rejected the legal theory put forth by the cities.
"The problem deserves a solution on a more vast scale than can be supplied by a district judge or jury in a public nuisance case," Alsup wrote in a 16-page opinion.
The cities wanted the defendants -- including BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, Exxon Mobil and Royal Dutch Shell -- to pay for projects like protecting coastlines from flooding.
Litigation by local governments in the U.S. including New York City, Boulder, Colo., and eight California cities and counties is a new front in the global fight against climate change.
But Alsup said the issues would more properly be handled by the other two branches of government. "The court will stay its hand in favor of solutions by the legislative and executive branches," he wrote.
Alsup said climate change was an issue of global importance but the companies were not solely at fault. "Our industrial revolution and the development of our modern world has literally been fueled by oil and coal," he wrote. "Without those fuels, virtually all of our monumental progress would have been impossible."
In light of that, he asked: "Would it really be fair to now ignore our own responsibility in the use of fossil fuels and place the blame for global warming on those who supplied what we demanded? Is it really fair, in light of those benefits, to say that the sale of fossil fuels was unreasonable?"
A Chevron executive sounded a similar note in response to the decision. "Reliable, affordable energy is not a public nuisance but a public necessity," said R. Hewitt Pate, Chevron's vice president and general counsel.
A business group that has been highly critical of the lawsuits, the National Association of Manufacturers, expressed satisfaction with the judge's dismissal of the case. "From the moment these baseless lawsuits were filed, we have argued that the courtroom was not the proper venue to address this global challenge," said the group's chief executive, Jay Timmons.
The cities had relied on the area of public nuisance under state common law, which allows courts to hold parties responsible for actions that interfere with the use of property.
Earlier attempts use nuisance claims in lawsuits about climate change have been heard under federal law in cases such as American Electric Power v. Connecticut, but none has succeeded. In a unanimous 2011 decision, the Supreme Court said the Clean Air Act displaced the federal common law of nuisance, leaving enforcement and regulation to the Environmental Protection Agency.
The cases lodged by San Francisco, Oakland and the other cities and counties have attempted to use the nuisance doctrine at the state level, working from the theory that state common law has not been similarly displaced. The fossil-fuel companies have tried to move the cases to the federal courts under federal law.
Alsup, in previous stages of the litigation, suggested that the federal courts could still hear such cases. He kept the suits filed by San Francisco and Oakland before him, and ordered an unusual "tutorial" on climate change to familiarize himself with the scientific issues.
But in a different courtroom in the same building, Judge Vince Chhabria -- also of U.S. District Court in San Francisco -- sent similar cases involving San Mateo and Marin counties and the city of Imperial Beach to state court. That litigation is pending.
John Cote, a spokesman for the San Francisco city attorney, said the city was considering its options. "This is obviously not the ruling we wanted, but this doesn't mean the case is over," he said. "We're reviewing the order and will decide on our next steps shortly."
Cote added that the city agreed with Alsup on one important point. "We're pleased that the court recognized that the science of global warming is no longer in dispute," he said. "Our litigation forced a public court proceeding on climate science, and now these companies can no longer deny it is real and valid. Our belief remains that these companies are liable for the harm they've caused."
Oakland City Attorney Barbara Parker said the city is weighing whether to appeal.
"Our lawsuit presents valid claims and these defendants must be held accountable for misleading the American people about the catastrophic risks to human beings and all forms of life on this planet caused by fossil fuel-driven global warming and sea level rise," she said in an email.
Information for this article was contributed by Peter Blumberg and Robert Burnson of Bloomberg News.
Business on 06/27/2018