kivalina v. exxon

Here's an interesting one. The city and Native village of Kivalina are suing Exxon, Peabody, Chevron, Shell, Duke Energy Co. and whole list of other oil companies and power producers for causing the coastal erosion that is putting the village at risk.
"Kivalina faces imminent destruction from global warming due to the melting of sea ice that formerly protected the village from coastal storms during the fall and winter," reads a press release sent out today.
The village is represented by two non-profit legal organizations and six law firms, according to the release, and its suit seeks relocation of the village, which is estimated to cost hundreds of millions of dollars.
One of the firms is the Center on Race, Poverty, & the Environment, which is already helping Kivalina residents sue the Red Dog Mine over pollution of drinking water.
The case is reminiscent of an effort in 2004 by the Inuit Circumpolar Conference to get a ruling from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights that the U.S. was threatening their existence by contributing to climate change. Not sure how that one panned out.
I can't imagine this new case will get far, but it's certainly an interesting legal argument. It invokes the federal common law of public nuisance, and the complaint includes information on the companies' emissions, global warming, and specific impacts in Kivalina. I suppose its not new that a scientific understanding gets picked apart by the legal process, but this seems big. Do IPCC's "very likely"s amount to a "preponderance of the evidence?"
The suit also seeks damages for "defendants' acts in furthering a conspiracy to suppress the awareness of the link between [their] emissions and global warming."