This looks more like the end of the climate litigation tunnel than an oncoming train.

Finally a federal district court judge puts on his big boy pants and calls a halt to the children’s climate crusade against the legal system.  Climate Liability News has the story Judge Tosses Penn. Case, Says Kids Climate Cases Have No Legal Merit  Excerpts in italics with my bolds.

A federal judge in Pennsylvania dismissed a climate lawsuit brought by an environmental organization and two children against the federal government. The lawsuit, Clean Air Council v. United States, claimed that Trump administration rollbacks of environmental regulations and other “anti-science” decisions violate Constitutional rights and the public trust.

In dismissing the claims on Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Paul Diamond scoffed at what he interpreted as a request that he “supervise any actions the President and his appointees take that might touch on ‘the environment.’”

Beyond ruling on this case, however, Diamond went further to rebuke U.S. District Judge Ann Aiken for her ruling in Juliana v. United States that the young plaintiffs had a Constitutional right to a livable climate. When Aiken ordered that lawsuit to trial in 2016, she said “the right to a climate system capable of sustaining human life is fundamental to a free and ordered society,” becoming the first U.S. judge to recognize that right.

Diamond said that ruling is at odds with previous court decisions and “the Juliana Court certainly contravened or ignored longstanding authority.”

He also took issue with what guaranteeing a stable climate would entail, calling it “without apparent limit.”

In dismissing the case before him, Diamond said the Pennsylvania plaintiffs, who filed the suit in 2017, lacked standing. The two boys said their serious allergies and asthma were directly linked to the impacts of climate change, but Diamond said they failed to directly tie their injuries to government actions. Diamond said he interpreted this case as a political dispute. “Plaintiffs’ disagreement with Defendants is a policy debate best left to the political process,” he wrote.

Diamond was appointed to his post by President George W. Bush in 2004.

The Clean Air Council said in a statement it “respectfully disagrees with the decision” and is discussing the next steps with its counsel.

“The Trump administration continues to rely on junk science to implement reckless climate change policies in the face of indisputable U.S. and international scientific consensus. For decades, the U.S. government has acknowledged that climate change presents a clear and present danger to life, and represents an urgent and potentially irreversible threat to human societies and the planet. These acts of deliberate indifference are increasing U.S. contributions to climate change, thereby increasing the frequency and intensity of its life-threatening effects, and violating our constitutional rights,” said Joseph Otis Minott, executive director and chief counsel of the Clean Air Council.

“We are troubled that the opinion states the federal government ‘do[es] not produce greenhouse gases’ and that ‘climate change is the creation of those that pollute the air, not the Government,’” he added. “These statements are both irrelevant to our claims and factually incorrect.”

Diamond made clear he does not see a role for the judiciary in climate policy and argued that Aiken’s recognition of the public trust claims in Juliana was an incorrect expansion of that doctrine beyond its traditional concept governing only navigable waters.

“Plaintiffs seek to create an entirely new doctrine—investing the Federal Government with an affirmative duty to protect all land and resources within the United States,” Diamond wrote. “The Juliana Court alone has recognized this new doctrine. Again, that Court’s reasoning is less than persuasive.”

A monkey wrench in the Works.

Previous posts have followed the twists and turns of the lawsuit Juliana vs. US, initiated and funded by Our Children’s Trust.  In November the Supreme Court signaled their desire that lower courts rein in the scope of the lawsuit.  The District Court backed off and now the Ninth Circuit Court will take up the appeal in advance of any trial activity.

The latest development is the US government (the Appellant) making its initial filing Feb. 1, 2019, now available for public scrutiny.

The document is Appellants’ Opening Brief Excerpt in italics with my bolds.

SUMMARY OF ARGUMENT

The district court first erred when it denied the government’s motion to dismiss this action. It erred again when it denied the government’s motions for judgment on the pleadings and for summary judgment. This Court should reverse for any of the following independent reasons:

1. Plaintiffs cannot establish any of the three requirements for Article III standing. Plaintiffs have only a generalized grievance and not the required particularized injury because global climate change affects everyone in the world. They cannot demonstrate causation because climate change stems from a complex, world-spanning web of actions across all fields of human endeavor, and Plaintiffs cannot plausibly connect their narrow asserted injuries — like flooding or drought in their neighborhoods — to any particular conduct by the government. In addition, Plaintiffs’ alleged injuries are not redressable because a single district judge may not (consistent with Article III and the equitable authority of federal courts) seize control of national energy production, energy consumption, and transportation in the ways that would be required to implement Plaintiffs’ demanded remedies.

Separate and apart from Plaintiffs’ failure to satisfy the three standing requirements, this action is fundamentally not a case or controversy under Article III. Plaintiffs did not ask the district court to resolve anything resembling the kind of dispute that gave rise to jurisdiction at common law or the adoption of Article III; Plaintiffs instead asked the district court to review all of the representative branches’ programs and regulatory decisions relating to climate change over the past several decades and then pass upon their constitutionality in the aggregate. No federal court has the power to perform such a sweeping policy review, and no federal court has ever done anything close to what Plaintiffs seek here.

2. Plaintiffs have failed to pursue any claim under the APA or any other remedial scheme established by Congress for review of federal agency action or inaction. At its core, Plaintiffs’ action challenges a vast number of federal agency actions and inactions, yet Plaintiffs have refused to comply with the requirements of the APA. Plaintiffs may not circumvent Congress’s considered judgment to channel such challenges through the APA by asserting a right to proceed directly under the Constitution or the courts’ equitable authority; the existence of the APA forecloses those potential causes of action.

3. Even if Plaintiffs could satisfy the foregoing threshold requirements, their constitutional claims are baseless and must be dismissed. Plaintiffs’ alleged fundamental right to a “livable climate” finds no basis in this Nation’s history or tradition and is not even close to any other fundamental right recognized by the Supreme Court. Plaintiffs’ reliance on the state-created danger exception is also misplaced; there is no reason to extend that narrow doctrine to these circumstances. Plaintiffs’ equal protection and Ninth Amendment claims are also meritless.

4. Finally, there is no federal public trust doctrine that binds the federal government. Even if such a doctrine did apply to the federal government, any common-law federal public trust doctrine is displaced by statute. In any event, the atmosphere is not within any public trust. The orders of the district court should be reversed, and this case should be remanded with instructions to dismiss the complaint.

Summary:

What a concept!  Let’s have judges decide national energy policy.  And when the economy fails because energy supply is too expensive and unreliable, will the black robes be accountable to the public?  Nope.  And let’s turn a courtroom over to members of a doomsday cult for 50 days so they can persuade the public of their beliefs and fears. Even worse idea. Let’s hope even the Ninth Circuit can see the folly in this proceeding.

For background on the lawsuit see:  Supremes Kick Kids Lawsuit Down the Road

For background on the false GHG Endangerment Finding see: GHGs Endangerment? Evidence?

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