2023-09-18 22:43:31
The state with the fifth-largest economy in the world is single-handedly leading the movement to end fossil fuels. Governor Gavin Newsom announced he would sign a law that would force corporations worth more than $1 billion to submit an annual carbon footprint. Around 5,000 companies are affected and will in future have to disclose what their production, disposal, supply chains, transport and employee travel activities contribute to greenhouse gases.
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At the same time, the Democrat informed about a lawsuit filed late Friday by California against ExxonMobil, Shell, BP, ConocoPhillips and Chevron. The state accuses the energy companies of knowingly misleading the public about the effects of oil and gas on the climate. The industry has accepted the consequences that threaten people’s well-being in increasingly frequent extreme weather events.
“The scale and scope of what the state of California is doing here can change things,” Newsom said at a Climate Week NYC panel. The California Chamber of Commerce is fighting tooth and nail against the new law. She had hoped that the governor would not put into effect the regulations already passed by Parliament. “This is a costly mandate that negatively impacts businesses of all sizes and California,” said Chamber Vice President Denise Davis.
Serious consequences expected
The director of the Environmental Economics Program at Harvard University, Robert Stavins, calls the federal initiative “promising.” Billion-dollar corporations “that only have a turnover of $35 in California are subject to the law.”
Serious consequences are also expected from the lawsuit against the oil companies. “Oil and gas companies have privately known the truth for decades that the burning of fossil fuels leads to climate change,” said California chief prosecutor Rob Bonta in response to the lawsuit. “But they fed us their lies and untruths in order to continue making record profits at the expense of the environment. Enough is enough.”
The scale and scope of what the state of California is doing here can change things.
Gavin Newsom
Governor of California
A study published in Nature magazine earlier this year referred to internal warnings from Exxon experts who pointed out the connection between global warming and fossil fuels as early as 1977. The company’s scientists were “shockingly knowledgeable and precise.”
Warning of more extreme weather events
United Nations climate experts warn of more extreme weather events such as hurricanes, heat waves and forest fires, melting ice caps and floods if global warming is not limited to 1.5 degrees Celsius. Despite the warning, many of the leaders of the biggest emitting states will not attend the United Nations climate meeting scheduled for Wednesday on the sidelines of the General Assembly.
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Frustration over what political leaders described as a lack of urgency was reflected in the protests at the start of the UN General Assembly in New York. The demonstrators also criticized US President Joe Biden, who approved two huge fossil fuel infrastructure measures this year: the “Mountain Valley” West natural gas pipeline from western Virginia to southern Virginia and the Willow oil drilling project in Alaska.
“If you want to win in 2024,” Emma Buretta from “Fridays for Future” warned the president, then he has to do something. “Stop using fossil fuels”.
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