(Reuters) – Maine yesterday became the latest state to sue major oil companies including Exxon Mobil (XOM.N) and BP (BP.L) and accuse them of deceiving the public about the role fossil fuels have played in causing climate change.
Maine Attorney General Aaron Frey in the lawsuit sought to hold Exxon, Shell (SHEL.L), BP, Chevron(CVX.N), Sunoco (SUN.N) and the American Petroleum Institute responsible for the potentially catastrophic consequences global warming could have on the state’s communities and fishing and tourism industries.
Maine is the ninth state to file a lawsuit accusing oil companies and industry groups of deceiving the public about climate change. Similar law-suits have also been filed by various tribes, cities and counties, along with the District of Columbia.
The companies in similar cases have denied wrongdoing and argued that the states are improperly seeking through the courts to usurp the federal government’s authority to regulate emissions. Representatives for Chevron and Shell on Tuesday raised similarbjections to Maine’s case.
“Addressing climate change requires a coordinated federal and international policy response, not meritless state court litigation attacking essential energy production,” Theodore Boutrous, a lawyer for Chevron at Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, said in a statement.
While many of the climate change cases were filed years ago, they have been tied up in litigation over whether the cases could be pursued in state, rather than federal court, preventing most of them from reaching the merits yet.
Maine’s lawsuit, which was filed in Cumberland County Superior Court, said rising sea levels caused by global warming pose a particular risk to the state since so many of its communities and key industries are concentrated on or near Maine’s 3,478 miles of coastline.
The lawsuit alleges that the companies knew about the climate harms that burning fossil fuels would lead to since the 1960s yet deployed public relations campaigns aimed at creating doubts about the climate impacts of their industry to protect their profits.
“For over half a century, these companies chose to fuel profits instead of following their science to prevent what are now likely irreversible, catastrophic climate effects,” Frey, a Democrat, said in a statement.
The lawsuit accuses the companies of creating a public and private nuisance and asserted additional state law claims of failure to warn and negligence trespass. It also accuses them of violating the state’s consumer protection law.
The complaint seeks unspecified damages, as well as an order requiring the defendants to abate the nuisances they allegedly created in Maine by providing funds to pay for adaptation, mitigation and resilience measures.
The case is State of Maine v. BP plc, et al, Cumberland County Superior Court, Maine, No. Unknown.
For Maine: Attorney General Aaron Frey, Victor Sher of Sher Edling, Adam Levitt of DiCello Levitt and Katie Beran of Hausfeld
