Law and the Environment : Environmental Lawyer & Attorney : Foley Hoag Law Firm : Boston, Washington D.C.

Two more decisions were released last week concerning whether nuisance claims could be brought with respect to harm alleged to have resulted from private conduct contributing to climate change. First, in Village of Kivalina v. ExxonMobil Corporation, the District Court dismissed nuisance claims. Second, in Comer v. Murphy Oil, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a District Court dismissal of nuisance claims related to damage resulting from Hurricane Katrina.

Village of Kivalina first. In this case, an Inupiat Eskimo village claimed that global climate change traceable to the defendants has essentially made their village uninhabitable. Notably and, I think, shrewdly, they did not seek injunctive relief, but sought only damages related to the cost of relocating the village. The District Court concluded both that the law suit raised non-justiciable political questions and that the plaintiffs did not have standing, because their harm was not fairly traceable to the defendants’ conduct.

The Fifth Circuit wasn’t buying either of these arguments in Comer v. Murphy Oil. To the Fifth Circuit, like the Second, in the American Electric Power case, the complexity of the underlying proof is not sufficient to render these types of cases non-justiciable. The cases involve tort claims; courts resolve tort claims – pretty much, end of story. I’ve got to say, from my lowly perch, that I think that the Second and Fifth Circuits got it right here. It’s easy to say that it would be better for Congress to deal with climate change than state legislatures or, as here, courts. However, that’s not that same as courts declining to exercise jurisdiction. I’d be surprised if the political question argument  has any real legs.

Standing is a different matter. I still think that both the traceability and redressability elements of standing are problematic. Plaintiffs in both Village of Kivalina and Comer v. Murphy Oil solved the redressability issue by seeking only damages, and not injunctive relief. Both the Second and Fifth Circuits noted that traceability, as a standing issue, necessitates only that the plaintiffs allege that the defendants’ conduct “contributes to” the plaintiffs’ injuries. This is not a stringent test. However, in light of the recent Supreme Court decision in Ashcroft v. Iqbal, I could imagine some courts looking askance at the types of allegations made in these complaints, even at a pleading stage.

On balance, what these cases tell me is that some of these cases are actually likely to be litigated all the way through to trial. Notwithstanding the potentially huge recoveries, it seems here that the cost to the defendants of paying out anything more than nominal damages would be high, and the prospects of successful defense of these claims are still reasonably good. That’s a recipe for trial, as far as I can tell.

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On Monday, the Court of Appeals for the 2^nd Circuit finally issued a decision in Connecticut v. American Electric Power Company, reversing the District Court decision which had dismissed this public nuisance law suit against six large generating companies. The decision is notable in a number of different respects and may have far-reaching implications

·  Standing. Following Massachusetts v. EPA, it is not really surprising that the plaintiffs were able to establish that they have suffered injuries sufficient to provide standing. The more questionable point is redressability. The Court acknowledged that it must be “likely” that the injury will be redressed by a favorable decision. The Court’s response to this issue was that the plaintiffs need not demonstrate that a favorable decision will eliminate the injury, only that it will provide some measure of relief. Even so, could plaintiffs really prove that even elimination of all CO₂ emissions by the defendants would have any impact on climate change? I’m extremely skeptical. The Court did note that there is a “lowered bar for standing” at the pleading stage, so we may see more of this issue as the case proceeds.

·  Displacement. Connecticut v. American Electric Power, unlike the North Carolina v. TVA case decided in January, is basically premised on federal common law of public nuisance. However, federal common law only exists in the absence of legislation addressing the same issues and is subject to “displacement” by such legislation. Following Massachusetts v. EPA, there is no doubt that the CAA provides authority to regulate GHG. What, therefore, is the role of federal public nuisance claims at this point? The Court’s ruling here left defendants alive to argue this issue another day. The Court noted that EPA has not yet issued a final endangerment finding and certainly has not issued regulations limiting GHG emissions from stationary sources. Thus, the problem complained of by plaintiffs “has not been thoroughly addressed by the CAA.” In other words, if either Waxman-Markey passes or EPA moves forward with regulations on its own, defendants may have another crack at dismissing Connecticut v. American Electric Power. 

·  Nuisance Claims in Other Contexts. In tandem with North Carolina v. TVA, this case certainly puts new life into nuisance as a potentially important arrow in the quiver for environmental plaintiffs. As we noted in January, the TVA decision left room for nuisance claims even where National Ambient Air Quality Standards have been attained. This leaves substantial room for nuisance claims in a variety of contexts, as long as underlying legislation hasn’t specifically preempted such claims

·  Prospects for Federal Climate Change Legislation. We have already discussed the choice between regulation by EPA and comprehensive federal cap-and-trade legislation. Now it appears that this dilemma has three horns, not just two. Which would generators prefer? Waxman-Markey or judicial injunctions following nuisance litigation?

It’s a lot to consider.

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Justice Potter Stewart famously said, with respect to obscenity, that “I know it when I see it.” I fear that the test for what constitutes an imminent and substantial endangerment under RCRA is no clearer than Justice Stewart’s subjective test regarding obscenity.

This week, in a decision that is good news for RCRA defendants, Judge Illlston, of the Northern District of California, ruled, in West Coast Home Builders v. Aventis Cropscience USA,  that risks posed by potential future vapor intrusion into buildings from a groundwater plume could not be “imminent and substantial” where no development has yet occurred on the property that is the subject of the litigation. The court was interpreting the Supreme Court’s statement in Meghrig v. KFC Western, to the effect that RCRA “implies that there must be a threat which is present now, although the impact of the threat may not be felt until later.”

Although Judge Illston’s interpretation of Meghrig seems right, other RCRA cases have been allowed to proceed, even though the relationship between the contamination and the exposure have often been equally attenuated. It seems that the court liked the simplicity of a black-letter rule that risks associated with conditions not yet in place can never be imminent.  I am not confident this case will provide much clarity, but even if it only establishes a bright line rule in one narrow corner of the "imminent and substantial endangerment" landscape, that's better than the prior morass.

A developer might reasonably respond to this decision by arguing that such a ruling means that the development will never happen, because no one will finance such a project without knowing that the potential vapor intrusion risk will be addressed. (And a court might respond by saying that that is a problem for Congress to solve, not the courts.)

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In 1992, in South Carolina Coastal Council v. Lucas, the Supreme Court held that a state statute or regulation that denies a property owner all economic use of her property requires payment of just compensation under the Takings Clause. The Court distinguished statutes and regulations from restrictions inherent in background principles of the common law of nuisance – the latter types of restrictions do not require just compensation.

The Supreme Court announced earlier this week that in the fall 2009 term it will hear another, similar, property rights case. The Court will hear an appeal of a decision by the Florida Supreme Court holding that a beach erosion control statute did not unconstitutionally deprive landowners of their property rights without just compensation. 

The facts in Stop the Beach Replenishment v. Florida Department of Environmental Protection are somewhat obscure and relate specifically to the consequences of beach replenishment in Florida. However, it again does raise the question of how the Supreme Court treats statutes. Prior to the 1960s, governments pretty much regulated nuisances pursuant to common law police power. Apparently, exercise of such power has the constitutional blessing of the Supreme Court.

On the other hand – to note the obvious – since the 1960s, across the gamut of environmental police power issues, use of statute and regulation has overtaken reliance on the common law. For some reason, however, constitutional jurisprudence has not caught up with reality on the ground. The whole idea of the common law is that it is flexible and changes over time. Is there any doubt that, had there not been an explosion of environmental statutes and regulations, there would have been an explosion in the development of the common law of nuisance? It seems near certain that courts would have identified numerous additional uses of property over the past 40 years that would now be considered nuisances.

Why should the same regulatory outcome require compensation if taken pursuant to statute or regulations, but not if it occurs as a result of judge-made common law?   

(In the interests of full disclosure, the broad question of how courts treat statutes, as opposed to the otherwise developing common law, was raised by my then-Professor Guido Calabresi in his 1982 book, A Common Law for the Age of Statutes.  Judge Calabresi, your student has not forgotten.)

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