News & Analysis
January 10, 2025
The deadly wildfires still raging in Southern California underscore the importance of California's effort to hold Big Oil accountable in court for its climate lies.
California is suing ExxonMobil, Chevron, Shell, ConocoPhillips, BP, Phillips 66, and the American Petroleum Institute to make these polluters pay for climate damages they’ve knowingly fueled — but deceived the public about for decades to protect their profits.
With the Palisades and Eaton fires still growing, experts say these could be the costliest wildfires in the state’s history.
Big Oil knew these climate-fueled events would threaten communities decades ago: A 1979 Exxon memo about the potential impact of burning fossil fuels found that “[t]he southwest states would be hotter, probably by more than 3°F, and drier,” predicting some of the very conditions that are fueling the fires in California.
Communities across the nation are now suing the fossil fuel industry for suppressing that information and lying to the public about the reality of climate change. California Attorney General Rob Bonta’s lawsuit against Big Oil, filed in 2023, argues that the polluters should help pay for the climate impacts burdening Californians, including the damage from increasingly severe wildfires.
“Climate change has caused and will continue to cause an accelerated increase in the risk, occurrence, and intensity of wildfires in California, resulting in wildfire-related injuries to the State and its residents,” California’s lawsuit states. “Once suppressed, climate change-driven wildfires leave shattered communities in their wake, resulting in further financial loss to the State for wildfire recovery efforts.”
A report from CCI calculated that it would cost Los Angeles County nearly $1 billion to mitigate wildfires from 2024 through 2040. That cost estimate does not include the costs associated with responding to and cleaning up wildfire events like the ones currently happening across Los Angeles County.
California’s lawsuit would require fossil fuel companies to stop lying about their product's role in causing climate change, make them pay for the damage caused by their lies, and forfeit profits illegally gained while deceiving the public.
“Californians and their families, communities, and small businesses should not have to bear all the costs of climate change alone; the companies that have polluted our air, choked our skies with smoke, wreaked havoc on our water cycle, and contaminated our lands must be made to mitigate the harms they have brought upon the State,” the lawsuit says. “This lawsuit seeks to hold those companies accountable for the lies they have told and the damages they have caused.”
Image: Palisades Fire, CAL FIRE via Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0
