California sued major oil companies including Exxon Mobil Corp and Shell PLC, saying they deceived the public for decades while creating or contributing to local climate catastrophes.
The civil case, filed in superior court in San Francisco, also targets BP PLC, ConocoPhillips, Chevron Corp and the American Petroleum Institute, according to a spokesperson at the attorney general’s office.
The lawsuit requests the creation of an abatement fund to finance climate mitigation efforts, an injunction to protect California’s natural resources, damages and penalties.
Photo: Reuters
The action includes some of the strongest allegations against oil giants as the state deals with increasingly destructive storms and weather events, from ravaging wildfires to “atmospheric rivers.” California has spent, and will continue to dish out, billions of dollars to recover from climate catastrophes, the complaint said.
“From extreme heat to drought and water shortages, the climate crisis they have caused is undeniable. It is time they pay to abate the harm they have caused,” Attorney General Rob Bonta said.
The increasingly heavy financial burden of climate disasters has prompted major US insurance companies to limit their coverage in California. State Farm General Insurance Co no longer accepts new applications for property and casualty coverage in the state.
The lawsuit comes ahead of New York City’s Climate Week, which runs alongside the UN General Assembly.
Shell said litigation was not the appropriate vehicle for addressing climate change.
“We do not believe the courtroom is the right venue to address climate change, but that smart policy from government and action from all sectors is the appropriate way to reach solutions and drive progress,” Shell said in a statement.
Chevron criticized the California government.
“Its local courts have no constructive or constitutionally permissible role in crafting global energy policy,” a Chevron spokesperson said. The company said it has been a “leading promoter of oil and gas development.”
American Petroleum Institute (API), for its part, defended the industry, citing environmental and green initiatives.
“The record of the past two decades demonstrates that the industry has achieved its goal of providing affordable, reliable American energy to US consumers while substantially reducing emissions and our environmental footprint,” API senior vice president and general counsel Ryan Meyers said in a statement.
Food and Water Watch, a DC-based advocacy group, commended California state leaders for taking this step, but said it would take years for residents to feel the impact of the payouts requested in the lawsuit. Instead, they called on California Governor Gavin Newsom to stop new fossil fuel permits, reject hydrogen and carbon capture and quickly move off fossil fuels.
Huawei Technologies Co (華為) largely omitted mention of its controversial Mate 60 smartphone series at a grand showcase of its new consumer products yesterday. The Shenzhen-based company would increase smartphone production in response to demand, said consumer division chief Richard Yu (余承東), without naming the handset triggering that surge. The Mate 60 Pro earned international notoriety with its advanced made-in-China processor last month, causing concern in Washington about Huawei’s progress toward developing in-house chipmaking capabilities despite US trade curbs. Huawei’s new phones have fired up the company’s sales and were among the top sellers in China in the week before Apple Inc’s
SLUMP: The electronics, machinery and traditional industries posted the largest decline in the past year; overall, sectors showed gains over the previous month Taiwan’s industrial production index decreased 10.53 percent year-on-year to 91.38 last month, falling for a 15th consecutive month on an annual basis, as weak global economic growth continued to weigh on end-market demand and investment momentum, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said on Saturday. The industrial production index gauges output in Taiwan’s four main industries: manufacturing, electricity and gas supply, water supply, and mining and quarrying. Last month’s decline was the smallest contraction since March when the index dropped 16.03 percent from a year earlier. On a monthly basis, the index rose 7.28 percent, marking a second straight month of improvement,
US-based tech giant Google said yesterday that its efforts to build four underseas cables to connect Taiwan with the world had created more than 64,000 jobs and generated about US$26 billion in GDP for Taiwan as of 2021. The US company has transformed Taiwan into a strategic cloud infrastructure hub in the world. The four undersea cables are part of the company’s investments in cloud infrastructure in Taiwan, and on the back of the undersea cables, a data center and a Google Cloud Region, which is a geographic area in which Google provides infrastructure and services for deploying applications, Google said in
SHOPPING SPREE: The wholesale sector has lagged behind as consumer goods spending has risen, with food and beverage spending hitting almost NT$90 billion Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 4.3 percent and 14.3 percent respectively from a year earlier, while sales in the wholesale sector fell for a 10th straight month and declined 5 percent annually, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said on Saturday. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales would retain growth momentum this month due to the opening of new shopping malls and the Mid-Autumn Festival. However, the wholesale sector is predicted to see sales drop for another month on an annual basis, as end-market demand remains weak and inventory
RSS