County of San Mateo v. Chevron Corp.

Three local governments in California (San Mateo County, Marin County, and the City of Imperial Beach) filed separate lawsuits in California Superior Court alleging that fossil fuel companies’ “production, promotion, marketing, and use of fossil fuel products, simultaneous concealment of the known hazards of those products, and their championing of anti-regulation and anti-science campaigns, actually and proximately caused” injuries to the plaintiffs, including more frequent and more severe flooding and sea level rise that jeopardized infrastructure, beaches, schools, and communities. Their complaints included claims for public nuisance, strict liability for failure to warn, strict liability for design defect, private nuisance, negligence, negligent failure to warn, and trespass. The relief sought by the local governments includes compensatory damages, abatement of the alleged nuisance, attorneys’ fees, punitive damages, and disgorgement of profits.