The western US state of California is on the front lines of wildfires, floods and other extreme weather events caused by climate change./AFP.
The US state of California on Friday accused five of the world’s largest oil companies of defrauding people by downplaying the climate change risks of fossil fuels, costing them millions of dollars, The New York Times reported. filed a lawsuit.
The lawsuit joins a number of other lawsuits brought by U.S. cities, counties and states against fossil fuel entities citing environmental impacts amid accusations of a decades-long disinformation campaign. It is.
The civil suit was filed in San Francisco Superior Court against California-based ExxonMobil, Shell, BP, ConocoPhillips, and Chevron. The New York Times added that the American Petroleum Institute was also among the targets.
The newspaper said that since the 1950s, these companies and their affiliates have “deliberately minimized the risks posed by fossil fuels to the public, even though they knew their products could cause significant global warming.” The lawsuit highlights the fact that the government was “limited to the limit.”
Representatives of the defendant organizations did not immediately respond to requests for response, the NYT said.
California is seeking to create a fund to address future damage caused by climate change in the state, which is a victim of wildfires, floods, and other extreme events caused by global warming.
“Oil and gas company executives have known for decades that dependence on fossil fuels would lead to these devastating consequences, but by actively spreading misinformation about the issue, they are threatening the public and policy makers. and deprived the planners of that information,” the lawsuit adds.
Litigation on this issue follows the model of successful lawsuits brought against big tobacco and the pharmaceutical industry in opioid proliferation cases.
Source: Diario.Elmundo
