In a major victory for the fossil fuel industry, a state judge for the first time has tossed out a local government’s entire lawsuit seeking to hold oil companies financially accountable for climate change.
The ruling issued Wednesday by Judge Videtta Brown of the Baltimore City Circuit Court found that the Charm City’s 2018 challenge against BP and other oil producers “goes beyond the limits of Maryland state law.”
Baltimore’s lawsuit — like dozens of others like it nationwide — relied on state law to claim that the oil industry owes the city compensation for storms and disasters worsened by rising temperatures.
But Brown said that Baltimore’s suit “requests damages for the cumulative impact of conduct occurring simultaneously across just about every jurisdiction on the planet.”