Climate risk disclosure requirements: Senate Appropriations Committee seeks guidance from SEC
Investors, legislators and others continue their efforts to require that publicly-traded companies enhance their disclosure of material business risks posed by climate change. In one of the most recent examples, the Senate Appropriations Committee’s July 14, 2008 report on the 2009 Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Bill (S. 3260) included language calling on the Securities and Exchange Commission to provide guidance on the appropriate disclosure of climate risk:
The Committee is aware that a petition was filed with the Commission on September 18, 2007, calling for the issuance of an interpretative release clarifying the application of existing law to the disclosure of risks associated with climate change. The Commission is encouraged to give prompt consideration to this petition and to provide guidance on the appropriate disclosure of climate risk.
Report at 108.
Continue Reading...Federal failure to regulate greenhouse gas emissions alleged by new climate lawsuit
On July 31st, Western Environmental Law Center attorney Dan Galpern is expected to announce what a press release describes as "a new lawsuit targeting the Bush administration's unlawful refusal to regulate certain major sources of global warming pollution." The announcement will occur during the eight-day Oregon Climate Convergence.
Continue Reading...Civil conspiracy claim targets political question defense in public nuisance climate suit
While three nuisance-based climate lawsuits have been dismissed by federal district courts because, among other reasons, they raised non-justiciable political questions, plaintiffs in the latest public nuisance case believe that the addition of a civil conspiracy claim will overcome the political question defense.
Continue Reading...International climate discussions and the political question defense
The first three major tort-based climate change lawsuits against alleged greenhouse gas emitters were dismissed in part because they raised non-justiciable political questions (all three cases are currently on appeal). For example, the district court in Conn. v. Am. Elec. Power Co., Inc. rejected a public nuisance case brought by 8 state attorneys general against 5 power companies based on the companies’ greenhouse gas emissions. The court held that the case was non-justiciable because it required “identification and balancing of economic, environmental, foreign policy, and national security interests” of a “transcendently legislative nature.”
Recent events offer added support for advocates of the political question defense in climate-based tort litigation:
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