2023-06-22 21:14:59
By Le Figaro with AFP
Posted yesterday at 9:37 PM, Updated yesterday at 11:14 PM
An extreme climatic episode had occurred in 2021. GERMAIN HAZARD / PANORAMIC
Companies targeted include Exxon Mobil, Shell, Chevron, BP, ConocoPhillips and Total Specialties USA.
A county in Oregon, in the northwest of the United States, announced Thursday, June 22, to file a complaint against several multinational oil companies to claim more than 51 billion dollars from them after the “heat domeof 2021, an extreme and deadly climatic episode.
Multnomah County says carbon pollution caused by the use of fossil fuel generated by these groups has played a role “importantin this event. Companies targeted include Exxon Mobil, Shell, Chevron, BP, ConocoPhillips and Total Specialties USA.
The heat domeis an event directly attributed to the impacts we are seeing on our climate from the actions of fossil fuel groups and their agencies, who have been pushing for decades to deny climate scienceCounty President Jessica Vega Pederson told AFP. The county is seeking $50 million in damages and $1.5 billion for future damage – extreme heat, drought, fires and smoke promising to become more common. He also asks companies to put 50 billion dollars in a “discount fund» impacts, in order to upgrade the infrastructure of the county.
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“Predictable”
Contacted by AFP, ExxonMobil judged that “these types of complaints continue to waste time and resources and do nothing to respond to climate change“. A record heat wave had slammed across the western United States and Canada from late June to mid-July 2021. The resulting death toll was estimated at 1,400 and a temperature of 49.6 degrees Celsius was registered in Lytton, BC. In an analysis, the World Weather Attribution (WWA), a group of scientists, claims that this dome would have beenpractically impossiblewithout human-induced climate change, which has made it at least 150 times more likely.
The Multnomah County complaint also names the American Petroleum Institute and the firm McKinsey. She claims that over three days at the end of June 2021, the county suffered from extreme heat, 69 people died and taxpayer money had to be spent (on water, air conditioners and “cooling centers” notably). “The heat dome was a direct and predictable consequence of the defendants’ decision to sell as many fossil fuel products as they could over the past six decades.“, According to the text, which accuses the multinationals of having lied about the harmful effects of their activities.
With this move, Multnomah County joins dozens of cities, counties and states across the country in filing lawsuits against oil groups accusing them of contributing to climate change and fueling misinformation. This wave of lawsuits began in 2017. The fossil industry has done everything to avoid lawsuits in the states, but suffered a setback in May when the Supreme Court refused to entertain appeals in two cases, which allowed the files to follow their course.
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“Clean and healthy”
These complaints take the example of cases having targeted the big names in tobacco and pharmacy, concerning cigarettes and opiates. “We’re not saying there are new laws or new theories here.said attorney Roger Worthington, of one of the firms representing the county. “We argue that the defendants broke long-standing laws, and we will prove it to a jury.»
In a high-profile case, a dozen young people accuse the state of Montana of violating their constitutional right to a “clean and healthy environment“. They are not asking for damages, “only that their government seizes its constitutional responsibility to mitigate the harm caused by its own actions“, according to a lawyer for Our Children’s Trust, one of the three associations supporting the plaintiffs.
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