Marin, San Mateo counties sue Big Oil over climate change

A tanker truck passes the Chevron refinery in Richmond. Chevron is one of the defendants in lawsuits filed Monday by Marin and San Mateo counties and Imperial Beach in San Diego County, seeking to hold energy companies liable for the effects of climate change. less A tanker truck passes the Chevron refinery in Richmond. Chevron is one of the defendants in lawsuits filed Monday by Marin and San Mateo counties and Imperial Beach in San Diego County, seeking to hold energy ... more Photo: Paul Sakuma, Associated Press Photo: Paul Sakuma, Associated Press Image 1 of / 40 Caption Close Marin, San Mateo counties sue Big Oil over climate change 1 / 40 Back to Gallery

Two Bay Area counties and a Southern California city concerned about rising sea levels sued 37 of the world’s biggest oil and coal companies Monday, claiming the fossil fuel giants should pay for damages wrought by climate change — a first-of-its-kind challenge that some liken to the high-stakes litigation of the tobacco industry in the 1990s.

Marin County, San Mateo County and Imperial Beach (San Diego County) filed separate but nearly identical lawsuits in their respective Superior Court offices that seek to tie fossil fuel development to climate-related problems in coastal areas. Lawyers for the three communities worked together to document such effects as more frequent flooding and beach erosion as well as the possibility that water will eventually inundate roads, airports, sewage treatment plants and other real estate.

The lawyers contend that the oil companies knew about the damage their actions were causing, denied it and sought to discredit scientific findings that greenhouse gas emissions were heating the Earth’s atmosphere.

The suits are the latest in a small but growing effort to hold Chevron, ExxonMobil, BP, Shell and other major energy companies accountable for the effects of global warming. Legal experts say the challenge is more comprehensive than previous endeavors, and is based on better climate science and more evidence to support a claim of conspiracy among oil company executives.

“This is a long-anticipated move in climate litigation,” said Michael Burger, executive director of the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia University. “You’ll find pieces of it in other cases, but bringing it together like this is different than what’s been done before. You can expect there will be a great deal of interest in how this litigation proceeds.”

Representatives of several of the energy companies named in the suit declined to comment or did not respond to calls from The Chronicle.

The two Bay Area counties and Imperial Beach are seeking reimbursement for current and future losses caused by climate change, as well as punitive damages. The suits don’t specify the value of losses so far, but estimate that the total will be in the billions of dollars over coming decades.

San Mateo County says the Bayshore Freeway, BART lines, San Francisco International Airport and $39 billion worth of assessed property are threatened by projected sea-level rise. Marin County counts $15.5 billion worth of North Bay real estate in harm’s way, along with ferry terminals, SMART rail tracks and Highway 101 and Interstate 580.

“There’s tremendous concern for us as a county on how do we address these issues,” said Marin County Supervisor Kate Sears. “This case is about fairness and accountability and standing up for our residents and businesses.”

Lawyers for Marin and San Mateo counties and Imperial Beach seek to show that the energy companies have created a public nuisance — legally, something that causes widespread harm. It’s the same doctrine that state attorneys general used in the late 1990s to win a $206 billion settlement from the tobacco industry over the health costs of cigarettes.

The three lawsuits also argue that the oil companies, again like the tobacco industry, conspired to mislead the public about side effects of their product. The suits claim that energy company executives knew for nearly 50 years that fossil-fuel development was warming the planet, but that they concealed their knowledge while continuing to push a destructive product.

Several past cases trying to hold the fossil fuel industry responsible for climate-related problems had little success.

A 2008 lawsuit filed by the Alaskan village of Kivalina claimed that about two dozen energy companies not only created a public nuisance by causing coastal flooding but also worked together to hide the effects of greenhouse gas emissions.

The case was tossed, with a federal appeals court determining that the federal Clean Air Act should govern greenhouse gases, not public nuisance doctrine.

John Beiers, San Mateo County counsel, said the California cases stand a better chance of succeeding because their claims are based on more up-to-date research on the effects of fossil fuels on global warming and more information on what oil company executives knew about those effects.

“We think we meet the elements of the public nuisance,” Beiers said, “but obviously we recognize this as the first lawsuit of its kind.”

In order to prove their public-nuisance argument, the Bay Area counties and Imperial Beach will have to show a specific connection between global warming and the actions of each energy company, said Burger, the climate-change legal expert. They will also have to show that the issue shouldn’t be handled through government regulation instead of a public nuisance complaint.

“It definitely has some significant hurdles, but in my own view, it’s not at all a frivolous case,” Burger said. “There are definitely legitimate legal claims that are being made here.”

Kurtis Alexander is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: kalexander@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @kurtisalexander

Rising Reality

Read Chronicle urban design critic John King’s stories on the challenges posed by sea level rise in the Bay Area: http://projects.sfchronicle.com/2016/sea-level-rise/