There’s been deep irony in Sacramento this summer, as some normally environmentally oriented state senators deep-sixed what could have been the year’s most important potential new environmental law.
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At issue was whether oil companies could be held liable for damage from future wildfires caused at least in part by climate change. The state Senate Judiciary Committee vote on the measure came just two days after a Louisiana jury held oil giant Chevron liable by for $744.6 million to restore damage to Louisiana’s coastal wetlands. The case was the first of many pending against oil companies that have supposedly lied about whether their policies led to land loss along that state’s coast, reaching from the mouth of the Mississippi River.
Keeping alive California’s somewhat similar bill (SB222) to allow for assessing damages after California fires would have required seven votes in committee, but it only got five, from Democrats Scott Wiener, of San Francisco; Ben Allen, of Santa Monica; John Laird, of Santa Clara; Henry Stern, of Los Angeles; and Akilah Weber Pierson, of La Mesa. Several senators avoided going on the record directly against this bill by abstaining from voting on it, which was essentially as good as voting “no.”
The bill was strongly opposed by business and labor groups, who contended that it would substantially raise California’s cost of living. One study was presented by the California Center for Jobs and the Economy, a nominally nonpartisan think tank founded by business interests that was established by the California Business Roundtable.
That study contended that “businesses facing massive litigation costs (like those assessed at least temporarily against Chevron) will pass expenses on to consumers.” That, it said, could raise gasoline costs to $7.38 per gallon and raise electric rates 65% for industrial users. Wiener and environmentalists backing the bill could muster no solid evidence against this contention, so Democratic senators like Tom Umberg, of Anaheim, and Maria Elena Durazo, of Los Angeles, withheld their votes.
Meanwhile, the Environmental Voters of California argued that assessing oil companies for damage they indirectly cause would save enough in insurance premiums to make up for any other costs. Most of the committee did not find that convincing, though. Business interests were delighted by the bill’s defeat.
“I applaud the members of the Senate Judiciary Committee who stood up for a more affordable California and voted down this unconstitutional measure,” said Kyla Christofferson Powell, the president and chief executive officer of the Justice Association of California, which does not disclose all its financial backers but has had past support from the California Association of Realtors. Wiener and other supporters had hoped his bill would become a model for other states where oil companies have lied about the effects of climate change.
“Californians are paying a devastating price for the climate disasters that have and will continue to wreak havoc on our state,” Wiener said.
Noting that the January firestorms that devastated large parts of Los Angeles County occurred far outside normal fire seasons, Wiener added that “tens of thousands of people in Southern California have lost their homes and large swaths of their community, and it happened in the middle of winter.”
He added that fires are not the only climate-related disasters afflicting California, saying mudslides and floods are also increasing. Meanwhile, Wiener insists, no mechanism exists in California to charge those damages to the parties most responsible for them — including oil companies. All this talk makes completely certain that a similar measure will be back before the Legislature next year.
“No company is big enough to walk away scot-free,” said John Carmouche, who was the lead plaintiff lawyer in the landmark Louisiana case.
Carmouche, of course, did not participate in the negotiations that forced California consumers to pay $21 million into the state’s Wildfire Fund to cover still unassessed costs from fires caused by power company equipment. No, companies like Southern California Edison and Pacific Gas & Electric did not quite “walk away scot-free,” but they came close to achieving that corporate aim.
The bottom line: If next year’s outcome on the inevitable attempt at a similar bill is to be different, there will have to be more hard information on the savings that a law like Wiener’s might bring.
Email Thomas Elias at [email protected], and read more of his columns online at californiafocus.net.