WASHINGTON (AP) — The United States Supreme Court said last week it won’t hear an appeal from oil and gas companies trying to block lawsuits seeking to hold the industry liable for billions of dollars in damage linked to climate change.
The order allowed the city of Honolulu’s lawsuit against oil and gas companies to proceed, The Associated Press reports. The city’s chief resilience officer, Ben Sullivan, said it’s a significant decision that will protect “taxpayers and communities from the immense costs and consequences of the climate crisis caused by the defendants’ misconduct.”
Elsewhere, New York State Supreme Court Justice Anar Patel rejected a suit by New York City, claiming the city “failed to prove that Exxon Mobil, Shell and BP misled New Yorkers about the climate impacts of fossil fuels,” E&E News reports.
The industry has faced a series of cases alleging it deceived the public about how fossil fuels contribute to climate change, AP says. Governments in states including California, Colorado, and New Jersey are seeking billions of dollars in damages from things like wildfires, rising sea levels, and severe storms. The lawsuits come during a wave of legal actions in the U.S. and worldwide seeking to leverage action on climate change through the courts.
In British Columbia, the Sue Big Oil campaign is mobilizing municipalities for a class action suit to recover fossil companies’ shares of the climate damages the communities will otherwise have to address with their own funds.
In the U.S. case, AP writes, the oil and gas companies appealed to the Supreme Court after Hawai’i’s highest court allowed the lawsuit to proceed. The companies include Sunoco, Shell, Chevron, ExxonMobil, and BP, many of which are headquartered in Texas.
The companies argued emissions are a national issue that should instead be fought over in federal court, where they’ve successfully had suits tossed out.
“The stakes in this case could not be higher,” attorneys wrote in court documents. The lawsuits “present a serious threat to one of the nation’s most vital industries.”
The American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank, said declining to hear the Honolulu case now means the companies could face more lawsuits from activists trying to “make themselves the nation’s energy regulators.”
“I hope that the Court will hear the issue someday, for the sake of constitutional accountability and the public interest,” said Adam White, a senior fellow at the institute.
The former Democratic administration of President Joe Biden had weighed in at the justices’ request and urged them to reject the case, saying it’s fair to keep it in state court at this point—though the administration acknowledged the companies could eventually prevail.
The incoming Republican Trump administration is expected to take a sharply different view of environmental law and energy production.
Honolulu argued it’s made a strong case under state laws against deceptive marketing and it should be allowed to play out there. “Deceptive commercial practices fall squarely within the core interests and historic powers of the states,” attorneys wrote.
Environmental regulations, meanwhile, have not always fared well overall before the conservative-majority court. In 2022, the justices limited the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s authority to regulate carbon dioxide emissions from power plants. In June, the court halted the agency’s air-pollution-fighting “good neighbour” rule.
Justice Samuel Alito recused himself from consideration of the appeal. He did not specify a reason, but he owns stock in companies affected by the lawsuits, according to his most recent financial disclosure.
The Canadian Press republished this Associated Press story on Jan. 13, 2025.
