WASHINGTON (Legal Newsline) - Rather than grant or reject a petition seeking appeal of a key ruling in a climate change lawsuit against the oil industry, the U.S. Supreme Court has instead asked the Biden Administration its thoughts.
The justices last week discussed a lawsuit in Hawaii, one of many filed nationwide alleging companies like Exxon, Chevron, BP and Sunoco created a "public nuisance" and seek money for infrastructure allegedly needed to handle a changing climate.
Private lawyers working on contingency fees have teamed with these government officials and won a previous ruling at the Supreme Court that allowed them to sue in state courts. The lawsuits were likely losers had they been heard in federal courts, where two judges had ruled it was not their jobs to impose international emissions standards before the SCOTUS jurisdiction ruling rendered them moot.
The Hawaii Supreme Court rejected Big Oil's motion to dismiss last year, ruling the cases are about disinformation and not emissions. In February, the defendants asked for Supreme Court review, and the justices held a conference to discuss whether to hear their appeal.
Instead of releasing an order granting or rejecting review, the U.S. Supreme Court asked the U.S. solicitor general to submit a brief to address the federal government's position.
“It is important for the U.S. Supreme Court to grant review," said Theodore Boutrous of Gibson, Dunn and Crutcher, which represents Chevron.
"The Hawaii Supreme Court’s decision flatly contradicts U.S. Supreme Court precedent and federal circuit court decisions, including the Second Circuit which held in dismissing New York City’s similar lawsuit, ‘such a sprawling case is simply beyond the limits of state law.’ These meritless state and local lawsuits violate the federal constitution and interfere with federal energy policy.”
The defendants want the court to answer whether federal law precludes state-law claims for injuries allegedly caused by the effects of interstate and international greenhouse-gas emissions.
The defendants said this case is the ideal opportunity to address the issue before judges in other state-court jurisdictions offer their own opinions.
"Contrary to the Hawaii Supreme Court’s decision, state law can only provide redress for harms caused by instate sources of emissions," the defendants wrote.
"Without this Court’s intervention, years might pass before another opportunity to address this pressing question comes along. The Court should grant review and clarify whether state law is competent to impose the costs of global climate change on a subset of the world’s energy producers chosen by respondents."
A recent Delaware ruling pared that state's case down to damages stemming from in-state emissions rather than global.
In its lawsuit, Delaware accuses the oil companies of “influencing the tenor of the climate change debate,” “maintaining strong working relationships between government regulators” and organizations “carrying defendants’ message,” and pushing for long-term solutions to climate change instead of immediate regulations on carbon emissions.
The state says those alleged deceptions caused consumers – presumably including the state itself, which operates thousands of vehicles and owns buildings heated with fossil fuels – to consume more oil and gasoline products than they otherwise would, increasing global warming and damage to state property.