On May 11, the U.S. Government asked a federal judge in California to toss out suits by Oakland and San Francisco seeking to hold the oil industry liable for climate change-related infrastructure damage.
The government argued that the cities’ claims are more rightfully handled by regulators and lawmakers, who should set the climate and energy policies.

Initially, the federal judge ruled that federal and not state law governed the cities’ claims that BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, Exxon, and Royal Dutch Shell promoted fossil fuel use despite knowledge that climate change could harm coastal cities. Then, the judge asked the government to submit a brief on the issue of whether the claims should be governed by federal common law: the government said no. “Although the cities cast their allegations in terms of the production of fossil fuels, their claim of injury is legally and factually tenable only to the extent that it is predicated on emissions of greenhouse gases from the combustion of fossil fuels,” the government said. “Through the Clean Air Act, Congress has directly addressed the issue of climate change by granting authority to address greenhouse gas emissions under federal law to the executive branch, thereby displacing any remedy that this court might otherwise create.” In other words, the government believes that the courts are not the appropriate forum for addressing issues of climate change effects on infrastructure. “Virtually every individual, organization, company, and government across the globe emits greenhouse gases,” the government argued. “If these cities may properly allege injuries from climate change, then so can every person on the planet. Federal courts are poorly equipped to handle this multitude of cases and the associated complex scientific, economic, and technical issues.”

In the coming weeks, the federal judge will be tasked with either letting the case proceed on the merits, or dismissing it, which the outcome that both the federal government and oil companies being sued are hoping for.