Climate Change is Here. Can Suing Big Oil Work?

"There are more and more communities across the country where courts are saying that they have a right to go toward trial. And in response, the fossil fuel industry is in absolute panic mode." - Mike Meno

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FEATURING MIKE MENO - A Washington woman is suing major oil companies such as Exxon Mobil over the death of her mother in 2021 when a massive heat dome in the Pacific Northwest resulted in her mother’s death. A judge just ruled that the case can go to trial in what may be one of the first such lawsuits of its kind. As the US remains in the grip of a deadly heat wave this summer, could such lawsuits help stop the on-going destruction of our climate?

Mike Meno is the communications director for the Center for Climate Integrity, a nonprofit advocacy group that supports communities in their efforts to hold Big Oil companies accountable for their climate deception and the resulting harms. He spoke with Sonali Kolhatkar about the case of Misti Leon and other lawsuits aimed at Big Oil.

ROUGH TRANSCRIPT:

Sonali Kolhatkar: So tell me first about Misti Leon. This is the woman who I referenced, whose mother passed away in 2021. What were the circumstances of her mother's death, and how is she making the case that it's linked to the actions of oil companies like Exxon? 

Mike Meno: Well, across the United States right now, there are dozens of state and local governments that are fighting in court to put companies like Exxon, Chevron, BP, and Shell on trial for deceiving the public about the harm of fossil fuels, and to make them pay for the resulting damages that their deception caused. 

But Ms. Leon's case is unique in that it is the first of its kind to seek to hold big oil companies accountable for their role in an individual's death in a climate-related disaster. So as your listeners may know, the 2021 Pacific Northwest heat dome was a massively destructive event. Hundreds, if not thousands, of people died across the Pacific Northwest in the United States and Canada. And it was an event that climate scientists determined would've been virtually impossible without fossil fuel climate change.