- Lawyers for several Big Oil firms urge a federal judge to throw out a lawsuit filed by New York City seeking to hold them financially liable for damages caused by global warming.
- NYC sued Chevron (NYSE:CVX), BP, ConocoPhillips (NYSE:COP), Exxon Mobil (NYSE:XOM) and Royal Dutch Shell (LON:RDSa) (RDS.A, RDS.B) in January, claiming the companies knew for years that carbon emissions caused global warming, and seeking monetary damages since it must spend billions of dollars to safeguard against flooding and other hazards of global warming.
- A lawyer for Chevron said at a hearing today in Manhattan that the lawsuit is an attempt to hold the oil companies liable for carbon emissions all over the world since the industrial revolution.
- A lawyer for the city denied that the lawsuit sought to hold the companies liable for emissions going back centuries, saying the city only claimed they became liable once they knew of fossil fuels’ risks.
- The judge wondered whether the city could hold the oil companies liable, since it used fossil fuels itself.
- Now read: Oil To 0? Probably Not Yet
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