California lawmakers introduced a first-in-the-nation bill Monday to create a clear legal pathway for individuals and insurance companies to sue oil companies for damages after fires like the ones that destroyed whole neighborhoods in Los Angeles this month.
What happened: State Sens. Scott Wiener and Sasha Renée Pérez introduced SB 222, the Affordable Insurance and Climate Recovery Act, on Monday with the goal of shifting the burden of increasing insurance costs from California ratepayers to fossil fuel companies.
“Our communities have never seen anything like this in urban Los Angeles,” Pérez, a Democrat whose district includes the town of Altadena, where the Eaton Fire destroyed over 9,000 structures and killed 17 people, said in a statement. “The reality is that climate change is here and will continue impacting communities everywhere.”
What’s in the bill: The bill would give individuals injured by extreme weather events the explicit ability to sue to recover their losses from oil and gas companies. It would also create a direct cause of action for private insurers and California’s insurance plan of last resort, or the FAIR Plan, to sue oil companies to recover harms to their businesses related to disasters that are fueled by climate change.
