Oakland v. BP

Although the sentence was passed in favor of the accused, the case is currently active, seeking justice. It is important to rescue the statement made by the court: “This order fully accepts the vast scientific consensus that the combustion of fossil fuels has materially increased atmospheric carbon dioxide levels, which in turn has increased the median temperature of the planet and accelerated sea level rise. But questions of how to appropriately balance these worldwide negatives against the worldwide positives of the energy itself, and of how to allocate the pluses and minuses among the nations of the world, demand the expertise of our environmental agencies, our diplomats, our Executive, and at least the Senate. In the same way, the court concluded that it could not exercise specific jurisdiction over the four companies, none of which was a resident of California, because it was “manifested that global warming would have continued in the absence of all California-related activities of defendants.” Because the plaintiffs “failed to adequately link” the four companies ’alleged California activities to the alleged climate change harms such as sea level rise, they did not satisfy the“ but-for ”causation standard for specific jurisdiction.


 * City of Oakland v. BP p.l.c.