Supreme Court Begins New Term with Significant Climate Case
The Supreme Court kicked off its new term on Monday by taking up one of the most significant climate-related cases in recent years. The justices aren’t necessarily tasked with determining the authenticity of climate change or its effects on global temperatures due to carbon dioxide. Instead, they are faced with a more fundamental issue: Who is responsible for the financial consequences?
In Suncor Energy v. Boulder County, the city of Boulder, along with Boulder County, seeks compensation from ExxonMobil and Suncor under Colorado law for costs they associate with the impacts of global warming, alongside claims related to misleading marketing practices. The Colorado Supreme Court has allowed these claims to go forward.
A Colorado jury might not be able to establish national climate policies, but the resulting verdicts from various state tort cases could collectively create a semblance of one.
The U.S. Supreme Court is considering whether federal law prevents these actions and if it even has the jurisdiction to rule on this matter at this point. The companies involved have received support from the Trump administration.
This case extends beyond just two oil companies and one local jurisdiction. Boulder’s claimed damages are rooted in greenhouse gases that have historically accumulated in a shared global atmosphere, stemming from energy consumption across all states and nations. Nonetheless, liability for these emissions would be determined by Colorado law exclusively for select companies.
Now picture the broader implications. California could formulate one approach to damages, New York might have another, and Hawaii could establish yet another standard. Almost 60 state and local governments are pursuing similar lawsuits. Different juries could assign varying costs for damages linked to the same pool of global emissions. If each jurisdiction can adopt its own legal framework, climate liability begins to resemble a form of carbon pricing enforced through litigation rather than an effort to compensate for localized harm.
Boulder insists it’s applying standard state tort laws and not attempting to regulate emissions directly. Yet, irrespective of how courts classify these actions, significant financial rulings against energy firms won’t merely remain a courtroom issue.
And then there’s the matter of China. The Global Carbon Project indicates that China is responsible for about 32% of global fossil fuel carbon dioxide emissions, while the United States accounts for approximately 13%. A Colorado court wouldn’t be able to impose liabilities on state-owned Chinese companies for emissions originating in China. This disparity is certainly hard to overlook.
New York serves as a cautionary tale. Its Climate Change Superfund Act sought to recover $75 billion from fossil fuel firms for past emissions, but one federal judge ruled it unconstitutional on August 31, followed by another federal judge doing likewise on September 23. Both decisions were grounded in the Clean Air Act and the federal government’s jurisdiction over international concerns. Although these cases focused on state laws rather than tort claims, they illustrate that the tension between state and federal authority is very much real.
The lawsuits also overlook the benefits that fossil fuels provide. These fuels support synthetic nitrogen fertilizer that helps feed approximately half the global population, along with contributing to medical plastics, transportation, and reliable energy sources. Liability cases can assess damages while neglecting to account for these advantages. Winning climate-related lawsuits could still lead to increased costs elsewhere in the economy.
Moreover, it’s worth noting that weather-related disasters didn’t just commence with today’s carbon levels. For example, the 1900 hurricane in Galveston claimed an estimated 6,000 to 12,000 lives. The great Peshtigo fire of 1871 occurred after a prolonged drought and consumed over a million acres, killing between 1,200 and 2,400 people. The Dust Bowl struck in the 1930s too.
This historical context doesn’t invalidate current scientific considerations but highlights a nuanced reality: attributing disaster causation is not a straightforward task. A court faced with assigning accountability for specific droughts, wildfires, or floods has to disentangle baseline risk from incremental climate impacts and distribute responsibility across global emissions.
Then there’s the pressing issue of costs. In the short term, energy demand tends to be fairly inelastic. As judgments potentially increase expenses for domestic suppliers, much of that cost will trickle down to consumers—at the gas station, on heating bills, and in the prices of everyday goods. Those in lower-income households tend to allocate a larger portion of their budgets on energy, thus they will feel the pinch more acutely.
While Congress holds the power to draft national climate legislation, and the EPA can regulate under the scope granted by Congress, voters have the option to ensure accountability. A local jury in Colorado can’t establish national climate doctrine, but an assortment of decisions from different states could create an indirect form of policy.
The justices are not required to resolve climate change debates per se. However, they do have to determine if state courts, through individual lawsuits, can impose liability related to a global emissions challenge.
The conclusion should be clear: the answer must be no.
