8-27-08 by dugan
It’s interesting that Andrew Cuomo, one of the few political rock stars, is all but sitting out the Democratic Convention. Instead, he’s productively suing the pants off of government and energy companies on behalf of the planet and the "future of our children" so much mentioned at the convention podium.
New York State Atty. Gen. Cuomo is a delegate, but scarcely visible in Denver. Over the last few days, however, he’s announced a 12-state lawsuit against the Environmental Protection Agency for its lax enforcement against oil refinery greenhouse emissions, and major progress in a suit intended to make energy companies more honest about the dirty coal they burn
Cuomo’s suit against utility companies demands that the companies disclose to investors the all of the liabilities they face from coal-burning plants, which the electric utilities continue to build. That’s because coal is cheap, until the environmental costs are considered. Come the day of effective caps on carbon emissions, investors will pay a price.
An investor-focused suit is more effective in forcing change than environmental finger-shaking.
Which brings up a similar case: Chevron’s liability for widespread toxic pollution in the Ecuadorean Amazon. The company has only begun disclosing the potential $6-billion-or-more liability to investors, even as the years-long lawsuit seems to be turning against Chevron.
California state Controller John Chiang issued a warning about another Chevron investment, in Russia, last year to the state retirement fund, which holds substantial Chevron stock. But it didn’t have the same effect as, say, an investor-protection lawsuit by California Attorney General Jerry Brown over all of Chevron’s poorly disclosed lliabilities. Brown has been sharp and tough on state environmental issues, and has his own suit against the EPA on California’s behalf. But he also has his own needs–including funding a run for governor next year.
Chevron has been generous in the extreme to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and both parties in the state. There’d be no reason for that generosity to stop when a new governor takes office.