Pirate's Cove

It’d be really funny if SCOTUS told Baltimore to stop using fossil fuels if they care so much

Fight to make Big Oil pay for climate change heads to Supreme Court

Baltimore may be a continent away from San Francisco, but the coastal cities have at least one thing in common: rising seas.

Both are seeing more flooding, more shoreline erosion and more battered infrastructure, and both want the oil industry to pay for the damage. They blame fossil fuels for the global warming that’s causing sea level rise.

First, there is nothing unusual about the sea rise: most of it is simply average or slightly above average, nowhere close to the norm for a Holocene Warm Period. Second, these people are nuts.

On Tuesday, Baltimore will lead the campaign to recoup billions of dollars from oil companies in a case before the U.S. Supreme Court. The city’s legal strategy is one that dawned in the Bay Area four years ago, when San Francisco and neighboring communities began filing lawsuits against the fossil fuel industry. The California tactics have since been embraced by nearly two dozen cities, counties and states nationwide, all of which could be affected by the high court’s pending action.

The question in front of the justices is not about the merits of the case. It’s about how a decision to hear the issue in state court versus federal court should be made. Still, the seemingly small procedural matter could have a big impact on whether the California communities and other litigants ultimately win money to cover potentially huge losses from climate change.

Oil companies should simply stop selling their products to the city of Baltimore, let’s see how the city operates, or, rather, doesn’t. They could also do away with all gas stations in the city, see how the Warmist residents like that. Same with San Francisco, along with the counties of San Mateo, Marin and Santa Cruz and the cities of Oakland, Richmond, Santa Cruz and Imperial Beach (San Diego County), who are part of this suit.

The plaintiffs want the cases to proceed in state court, where their legal challenges are tailored. They argue that companies such as Chevron Corp., Shell and ExxonMobil sold fossil fuel products while knowing their goods were harming the climate, akin to what the tobacco industry did with cigarettes and public health decades ago. They allege violations of state public nuisance law and state consumer protection law.

Conversely, the oil companies want the cases in federal court. They believe the judges there will defer to federal laws governing greenhouse gas emissions, namely the Clean Air Act, making the state-level allegations moot.

Should be interesting how it turns out. And, again, stop selling your products to people suing you.