Climate Point: Supreme Court opts not to weigh in on climate change lawsuits
Welcome to Climate Point, your weekly guide to climate, energy and the environment. I'm Dinah Voyles Pulver, with Paste BN's national climate and environment team.
In Washington this week, President-elect Donald Trump's nominees to lead the EPA, the Department of Interior, and the Department of Energy were in confirmation hearings, where they were quizzed about climate change and wildfires among other questions. In California, firefighters continue to battle the Los Angeles blazes that have burned over more than 40,000 acres and killed at least 27 people.
The U.S. Supreme Court won't be weighing in for now on whether federal law prevents states and cities from suing oil and gas companies to recover damages for harms caused by climate change, reported Paste BN's Maureen Groppe. The Court announced Monday it would not be taking up the question.
Representatives of the fossil fuel industry had stated it was critically important for the court to weigh in before the industry spends significant resources fighting the suits. “The stakes in this case could not be higher,” lawyers for multiple companies told the Supreme Court in appealing a decision by the Hawaii Supreme Court allowing a lawsuit by the city of Honolulu to move forward.
LA fires fall out
As if the fires weren't bad enough, the next rainfall is expected to drain toxic sludge ‒ remains from burned houses and cars ‒ into Santa Monica Bay. This could cause a fish die-off, experts warn, and undo the hard work over recent decades to clean up the bay.
Experts also warn homeowners against cleaning up or even sifting through their own burned-out properties, comparing what remains to the dangerous "burn pits" used by the military in Iraq and Afghanistan to dispose of waste that were later linked to cancer.
Turbine talks
Conversations over producing renewable energy with wind turbines off the U.S. Atlantic Coast continued this week in a flurry of developments.
Rhode Island. The state's largest utility extended its talks with Ocean Winds, developer of a project known as SouthCoast Wind, the Providence Journal reported. The deadline was pushed to March 31, to align with separate negotiations taking place with electric distribution companies in Massachusetts for offshore wind power, according to Caroline Pretyman, spokeswoman for Rhode Island Energy.
Massachusetts. Officials are lining up in opposition in the event President-elect Donald Trump decides to issue an executive order to halt offshore wind turbine projects along the East Coast.
Members of the Massachusetts Legislature, the state's congressional delegation and local environmentalists say they would fight such an order. U.S. Sen. Edward Markey, D-Massachusetts, said he would “vigorously challenge any political attacks on clean energy technologies that are driven by the fossil fuel industry’s fear of competition.”
New Jersey. Congressman Jeff Van Drew has said he's collaborating with Trump to draft the executive order on offshore wind. "These offshore wind projects should have never been approved in the first place," Van Drew said in a statement.
The anti-offshore wind organization Save LBI recently sued a group of federal agencies and Atlantic Shores Offshore Wind, a company preparing to build New Jersey's first offshore wind power project.
Nantucket. As federal regulators continue an investigation into an offshore wind turbine blade that shattered and littered a Nantucket beach with debris in July last year, a meeting Nantucket leaders planned with the regulators was rescheduled. After the Nantucket Select Board invited the public to submit questions for the federal Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement, the Select Board said regulators needed more time to respond to all the questions.
Feds weigh in on two marine mammal issues
It’s winter in Florida and that means residents and visitors have eyes on two beloved marine mammal species. Manatees gather for warm water refuge in places where they’re easier to see and North Atlantic right whales can be seen offshore after migrating southward from New England and Canada for a winter calving season in the Atlantic Ocean off Florida and Georgia.
Advocates for the critically endangered right whales voiced dismay this week when the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced it would not move forward with a proposed rule expanding offshore boat speed limits to protect the animals. The decision was welcomed by officials and members of the marine industry who had expressed concerns about the economic impacts of the proposed restrictions.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced this week it would keep the West Indian manatees in Florida listed as a threatened species and not return the gray sea cows to endangered status on the federal protected species list. A study by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission concluded somewhere between 8,350 and 11,730 manatees live in Florida waters.
Read on for more, including a look at right whale sightings this week off the Florida coast. Some stories below may require a subscription. Sign up and get access to eNewspapers across the Paste BN Network. If someone forwarded you this email and you'd like to receive Climate Point in your inbox once a week, sign up here.