Comeback

You’ve probably never heard of the town of Kivalina. It had only 374 residents as of the 2010 census and is located on a remote Alaskan island. But in 2008 Kivalina made history when it sued the Exxon Mobil Corporation and eight other oil companies, 14 power companies and one coal company in federal court. Threatened by coastal erosion and rising sea levels, the town plans to relocate, at a cost of between $95 and $400 million. In its suit the town claims that the defendants emitted sizeable amounts of the greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming, which is causing rising sea levels. The suit went all the way to the Supreme Court, which decided not to hear the case, thus effectively ending the town’s claim. The courts had already decided, in the 2011 case American Electric Power vs. Connecticut, that climate change damage is a matter for the executive and legislative branches of the government, not for the courts.

Was Kivalina’s court case thus simply another claim in the litigation-happy United States? Can one in fact pinpoint polluters and assess their individual contributions to global warming? Thanks to research published recently in the journal Climatic Change, we now have the calculations that show that only 90 companies, most of them fossil-fuel producers, have caused two thirds of all the man-made global warming emissions since the start of the industrial age. Half of these gases have been emitted in the last 25 years. We’ve known about climate change for longer than that. It could thus be argued that these companies have acted irresponsibly and should be fined or their activities stopped; not by bringing suit in federal court, but by act of Congress or by the EPA.

It is thought that the situation may be different in state courts, or in other countries with different legal systems. Suing the polluters might be possible there. As more and more companies are busy suing governments for lost earnings due to environmental regulations, they would get a taste of their own medicine.

Of course there is a catch here. Who has bought the fossil fuels produced by these polluting companies? You and I and the next-door neighbor. It can certainly be argued that Exxon Mobil and other oil companies would not be the giants they are, in both production and pollution figures, if everyone with an oil furnace and a car did not buy their products. Thinking in terms of court cases is perhaps not the point here. It is rather that these companies have lobbied and spent millions of dollars limiting our choices where energy is concerned. It is the consciousness-raising, the concrete evidence of just how gigantic these companies are and the dire necessity of getting away from fossil fuels that should motivate us. A David and Goliath story in which Goliath is pointed out as the bully he is.

And let’s not forget that David won.