Energy companies win dismissal of Baltimore’s climate change case

Baltimore’s lawsuit seeking to hold oil and gas companies accountable for the effects of climate change on the city was dismissed Wednesday by a Baltimore City Circuit Court judge.

Originally filed in 2018, the suit has been mired in complex procedural disputes practically ever since, bouncing from court to court — including the U.S. Supreme Court, which resolved one legal question in 2021, allowing the case to continue.

In a statement Thursday, the Baltimore City law department vowed to appeal the dismissal.

“We respectfully disagree with this opinion and will be seeking review from a higher court,” said Sara Gross, chief of the Baltimore City Department of Law’s Affirmative Litigation Division.

City officials declined to comment further on the ruling.

Similar cases have been filed by Annapolis and Anne Arundel County, as well as a number of other cities and states in the U.S., but none have gone to trial.

After the state supreme court of Hawaii ruled that Honolulu’s case could go forward to trial, the energy companies petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court. If the high court takes up the matter, the ruling could determine the future for all such cases.

Last month, the Supreme Court sought input from the Biden administration on the appeal, an indication that the justices could be interested in hearing the case.

Like the others, Baltimore’s case argued that the companies, including ExxonMobil and Chevron, deceptively promoted fossil fuels, despite knowing that their use posed a powerful threat of warming the world.

For years, attorneys in the case have battled over whether it should be heard in federal or state courts. The fossil fuel companies generally argued the cases belonged in federal courts, if anywhere, whereas localities argued they should be heard in state courts, which they considered a more favorable venue.

In her ruling Wednesday, Judge Videtta A. Brown dismissed the city’s claims under state law, a first for this type of climate change litigation.

The city argued that its case was merely focused on the oil and gas companies’ deceitful marketing, which caused increased use of fossil fuels, spurring climate change impacts on city infrastructure, such as more frequent flooding. But Brown ruled that the city was truly trying to receive damages for fossil fuel emissions — not just deceptive marketing — and those interstate emissions are regulated by the federal government, including the Environmental Protection Agency, under the Clean Air Act. As a result, the city cannot sue over it, according to Brown.

“The explanation by Baltimore that it only seeks to address and hold Defendants accountable for a deceptive misinformation campaign is simply a way to get in the back door what they cannot get in the front door,” Brown wrote in her ruling.

Brown said her ruling aligned with a ruling from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, which dismissed New York City’s climate lawsuit from federal court.

“Global pollution-based complaints were never intended by Congress to be handled by individual states,” Brown wrote.

“Climate policy cannot be advanced by the unconstitutional application of state law to regulate global emissions,” wrote a spokesperson for Chevron.