- What happened: The Hawaii Supreme Court is asking SCOTUS to clearly define whether state public nuisance law can apply to global climate change lawsuits.
- Honolulu is one of dozens of cities, states and municipalities that have filed public nuisance lawsuits against energy companies.
- Dig deeper: Public nuisance lawsuits—including those related to climate change—have proliferated as a means for local governments to attempt to pad their budgets and for activists to circumvent the appropriate legislative process.
- How we got here: SCOTUS has declined to move other climate nuisance lawsuits to federal court, opening the floodgates to more of this kind of litigation in various state courts around the country.
- ICYMI: Courts have repeatedly ruled that public nuisance only applies to actions–not products. It’s nonsensical for state courts to suddenly decide that a legal activity (like oil and gas production) is a nuisance. Catch-up in the TLR Advocate
- What about Texas? A 2023 measure establishing guidelines to help courts determine cases where the public nuisance doctrine should not apply was not passed by the Legislature.
- TLR Thoughts: With billions of dollars, national climate policy and consumer energy costs at stake, SCOTUS has an opportunity to rein in inappropriate public nuisance litigation and define state courts’ authority in these types of cases. Until state public nuisance laws are clarified, the proliferation of these lawsuits will continue.
Read the full article here.