{"id":27066,"date":"2025-05-02T18:54:05","date_gmt":"2025-05-02T18:54:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=27066"},"modified":"2025-05-02T19:23:42","modified_gmt":"2025-05-02T19:23:42","slug":"new-climate-superfund-laws-face-widening-legal-challenges","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=27066","title":{"rendered":"New \u2018Climate Superfund\u2019 Laws Face Widening Legal Challenges"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The Trump administration sued to block two state laws designed to force oil companies to pay the costs of climate change. Several other states are joining the fight, too.<\/p>\n

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Vermont made history last year when it enacted<\/a> the country\u2019s first climate superfund law. It\u2019s designed to let the state recover money from fossil fuel companies to help pay the rising costs of climate change.<\/p>\n

If the law can survive intensifying legal challenges, that is.<\/p>\n

On Thursday, the Justice Department filed federal lawsuits against Vermont<\/a> and New York, the only other state to have enacted a climate superfund law, arguing that the measures were \u201ca brazen attempt to grab power from the federal government\u201d and force others to pay for the states\u2019 infrastructure spending.<\/p>\n

Hours later, West Virginia\u2019s attorney general, John B. McCuskey, announced that he was leading another challenge to Vermont\u2019s law<\/a>, saying the measure would \u201cfine America\u2019s coal, oil and natural gas suppliers into oblivion.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr. McCuskey had already filed a similar lawsuit against New York\u2019s law<\/a>, which seeks $75 billion from oil and gas companies over the next 25 years. On Thursday, he said Vermont\u2019s version might be \u201ceven more dangerous\u201d because it has no monetary cap.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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He and 23 other attorneys general are seeking to join a lawsuit filed late last year<\/a> by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the American Petroleum Institute, an industry group, in federal court in Vermont.<\/p>\n

West Virginia is a major producer of natural gas and coal. Its complaint argues that the activities of fossil-fuel companies are legal and that \u201cVermont seeks to have its cake and eat it too, by both reaping the benefits of affordable and reliable fuel, yet penalizing the entities that help produce such fuel.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The Trump administration sued to block two state laws designed to force oil companies to pay the costs of climate change. Several other states are joining the fight, too.Vermont made history last year when it enacted the country\u2019s first climate superfund law. It\u2019s designed to let the state recover money from fossil fuel companies to help pay the rising costs of climate change.If the law can survive intensifying legal challenges, that is.On Thursday, the Justice Department filed federal lawsuits against Vermont and New York, the only other state to have enacted a climate superfund law, arguing that the measures were \u201ca brazen attempt to grab power from the federal government\u201d and force others to pay for the states\u2019 infrastructure spending.Hours later, West Virginia\u2019s attorney general, John B. McCuskey, announced that he was leading another challenge to Vermont\u2019s law, saying the measure would \u201cfine America\u2019s coal, oil and natural gas suppliers into oblivion.\u201dMr. McCuskey had already filed a similar lawsuit against New York\u2019s law, which seeks $75 billion from oil and gas companies over the next 25 years. On Thursday, he said Vermont\u2019s version might be \u201ceven more dangerous\u201d because it has no monetary cap.He and 23 other attorneys general are seeking to join a lawsuit filed late last year by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the American Petroleum Institute, an industry group, in federal court in Vermont.West Virginia is a major producer of natural gas and coal. Its complaint argues that the activities of fossil-fuel companies are legal and that \u201cVermont seeks to have its cake and eat it too, by both reaping the benefits of affordable and reliable fuel, yet penalizing the entities that help produce such fuel.\u201dWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and\u00a0log into\u00a0your Times account, or\u00a0subscribe\u00a0for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?\u00a0Log in.Want all of The Times?\u00a0Subscribe.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27068,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27066","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27066","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27066"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27066\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27069,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27066\/revisions\/27069"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/27068"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27066"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27066"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27066"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}