In the Shoalwater Bay and Makah Indian Tribes’ state-law suits against fossil fuel industry defendants, the Washington Superior Court granted ConocoPhillips and ConocoPhillips Company’s (together ConocoPhillips’s) motion to dismiss the Tribes’ amended complaints for lack of personal jurisdiction. The court previously dismissed the Tribes’ complaints against ConocoPhillips on April 29, 2026, finding that the complaints only pled facts before 2012, which was insufficient for the exercise of jurisdiction over the claims. Regarding the amended complaint, the court found that the plaintiffs did not allege purportedly deceptive statements regarding climate change by ConocoPhillips that targeted Washington. The court also declined to impute subsidiaries’ forum contacts to ConocoPhillips. In addition, the court reiterated that pre-2012 contacts did not relate to the plaintiffs’ claims, found that the plaintiffs failed to allege facts tying a single ConocoPhillips office to their claims, and further found that, even if alleged contacts were not time-barred or if subsidiary contacts could be imputed to ConocoPhillips, “contacts consisting of crude-oil deliveries and gas-station and refinery operations” did not relate to the Tribes deception-based claims. The court dismissed the complaints without leave to amend.

Tribe's lawsuit seeking to hold fossil fuel companies liable for climate change harms allegedly resulting from the companies' "climate deception campaign."

Shoalwater Bay Indian Tribe v. Exxon Mobil Corp.

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ConocoPhillips Defendants Dismissed from Tribes’ Climate Cases on Personal Jurisdiction Grounds; No Leave to Amend

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Policy instruments are techniques or tools used by governing authorities to promote certain policies in order to achieve predetermined goals. Put simply, instruments are how a government tries to achieve its goals, with this taxonomy being focused on national policy instruments.

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A set of principles, processes, and practices that build economic and political power to shift from an extractive economy to a regenerative economy.

Justice is the ethical and political framework that addresses fairness, including issues of responsibility, rights, and structural inequity.

Renewable energy means all forms of energy produced from renewable sources in a sustainable manner.

Fossil fuel is a generic term for non-renewable energy sources such as coal, fossil gas, and oil (including crude oil, and petroleum products), that can be used for electricity and heat generation. Fossil fuels are hydrocarbons formed from pressurised and heated organic material buried over millions of years.

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Area of the economy in which actors engage in identical or related activities.

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Oil is a combustible liquid fossil fuel composed mainly of hydrocarbons, occurring as crude oil and refined into petroleum products such as petrol, diesel and kerosene.

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ConocoPhillips Defendants Dismissed from Tribes’ Climate Cases on Personal Jurisdiction Grounds; No Leave to Amend

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Fossil fuel