LA needs to prevent alarmism jackpot justice

Proactive legislation addressing the potential costs of climate alarmism could save Louisiana businesses much time, money, and hassle, in creating a fairer business climate for the state.

HB 804 by Republican state Rep. Brett Geymann would prevent suits against companies for greenhouse gas emissions that weren’t in violation of the specific permits issued for the emitter or those not violating the Occupational Safety and Health Act. Those gases are carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and fluorinated gases.

Passage of this bill would obviate the possibility that these concerns in state would have to battle nuisance suits brought by climate alarmists. Elsewhere in the country, increasingly Chicken Little local governments have sued firms that produce these gases, alleging these caused individuals’ deaths or maladies or even possibly could, amounting to over two dozen such actions. A smattering of individual plaintiff cases also have begun to circulate.

It wasn’t supposed to be this way after the U.S. Supreme Court decided American Electric Power Company v. Connecticut in 2011. There, the Court ruled that the Clean Air Act was not construed in a way that would permit such suits from any person or entity and was the only authority under which action could be taken. Unfortunately and contrarily, state courts friendly to alarmism recently began to allow such suits under state law despite that declaration that only the federal government could enforce.

None have had trials on the merits as yet, which typically attack from two angles: emitters are causing damage to public health and/or acted fraudulently by knowing higher levels of emission were “dangerous,” despite the utter lack of evidence behind catastrophic anthropogenic global warming supposedly triggered by too much emissions. And these successes may not have that much shelf life, either, as the Court will take up Suncor Energy v. County Commissioners of Boulder this coming term that challenges a state court’s ability to adjudicate these cases.

Still, its decision could be more than a year away or a rendered decision adverse to common sense validates Louisiana having HB 804 come into law. Insanely stupid analysis, if it can be dignified with that term, lies behind these efforts. In essence, cases single out select firms – even though potentially thousands emit – blamed for emissions congregating in a particular area – which in fact could have come from anywhere on the planet – that created some kind of harm – without any proof of specific causation to specific alleged “victims” – even if the “harm” can’t be measured in any objective way at present or could have come from alternative sources. It’s a Wild West of torts that would make Louisiana ambulance chasers green with envy.

The risk of subjection to such nonsense surely weighs in whether a fossil fuel firm locates or expands in Louisiana. Removing this source of jackpot justice can’t but make the state look more attractive for business. (GOP Atty. Gen. Liz Murrill had a chance last year to sign a letter by some of her counterparts in other states asking the federal government to increase measures opposing climate lawfare, but didn’t.)  Legislators owe it to Louisianans to move this bill – this week the House should consider it after it passed out of committee unanimously – into statute as soon as possible.