Sierra Club filed a lawsuit in California Superior Court against San Diego County charging that the County’s approvals of three residential developments did not require enforceable measures to mitigate the projects’ impacts on greenhouse gas emissions and climate as required by the California Environmental Quality Act. The petition alleged that the approval of the “three large residential development projects in the County’s rural back-country areas” would result in just under 4,000 new residential units and over 800,000 square feet of commercial office space. Sierra Club further alleged that the County allowed the projects’ impacts to be mitigated with off-site greenhouse gas emissions offsets “anywhere in the world” at the discretion of a County planning official. Sierra Club contended that allowing offsets outside San Diego County violated a mitigation measure adopted for the County’s general plan. Sierra Club also restated its challenge—previously made in separate lawsuits filed in March 2018—to the County’s Climate Action Plan, which Sierra Club alleges also did not satisfy the general plan’s mitigation requirements.

Challenge to San Diego County's approval of residential developments, allegedly without complying with requirements for enforceable measures to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions.

Sierra Club v. County of San Diego

<p>This entry was provided by the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law. Please see the terms of use for citation and licensing of third party data.</p>

Sierra Club Challenged San Diego County Approval of Developments, Alleging Failure to Ensure Mitigation of Greenhouse Gas Emissions

Filed

The Climate Litigation Database

Find climate change litigation data and indicators for {text}.

{text} litigation

Sabin Center for Climate Change Law provides Climate Litigation Database, a comprehensive database of US and Global climate change caselaw

Quickly and easily search through the complete text of thousands of climate change law and policy documents from every country.

Search the Climate Litigation Database

An aim to achieve a quantifiable outcome within a given time-frame, set by an institution such as a national government.

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.

Risk is the potential for adverse consequences resulting from the dynamic interplay between (climate-related) hazards, exposure, and vulnerability of affected human or ecological systems.

Groups  of people who are adversely affected by climate change or the response to it

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.

Molecules in the atmosphere that play a key role in the greenhouse effect by trapping heat radiating from Earth’s surface.

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

In human systems, the process of adjustment to actual or expected climate change and its effects, in order to moderate harm, increase resilience or exploit beneficial opportunities. In natural systems, the process of adjustment to actual climate change and its effects; human intervention may facilitate adjustment to expected climate change and its effects.

The management and allocation of funds, assets and investments to meet various objectives

Direct investments by the governments using public funds. This can be to support climate initiatives or integrate climate into other projects.

Financial support to help individuals manage the effects of unexpected events, securing their livelihoods and increasing the resilience of people and businesses to the changing climate. It’s especially vital in developing regions where everyday risks, climate-related weather extremes, or crop failures can push people into poverty. Without insurance, people may have to resort to selling assets or cutting consumption to cope with losses.

Tradable permits are market-based tools that grant permission for specific activities, frequently used to regulate emissions. These permits can be issued within a trading system to manage environmental impacts.

Zoning and spatial planning are both methods for guiding the distribution of people and activities in a space, and are regulatory restriction.

A ban is a legal action that prevents the sale or supply of a product or service, or that recalls a product from the market. Examples are bans on SF6, greenwashing, fossil fuel advertisement or single-use plastics.

A target to reduce the prevalence of a greenhouse gas over a specific time frame

Either money or something of monetary value is transferred between two or more organisations, people or countries.

Terrestrial means "of the earth" and relates to the risks to ecological system that includes all living organisms and their interactions within land-based environments, such as forests, grasslands, and deserts.

Air pollution involves harmful contaminants in the air, affecting both indoor and outdoor environments. It can lead to health issues like respiratory diseases and heart problems, and climate impacts such as global warming. Pollutants can damage plants, trees, habitats, and water bodies like rivers and lakes.

Social protection systems consist of policies that help people manage social risks in order to prevent poverty and maintain decent incomes and living standards

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.

The activities of industries that transforms raw materials into finished goods through industrial processes.

Activities that involve planning, designing and building infrastructure, residential, and commercial structures.

This sector involves activities to move goods and people, alongside the storage of products.

This sector creates and distributes information and entertainment through television, radio, print, and digital platforms.

This sector provides communication services, software development, and IT solutions.

Activities that involve the cultivation of crops and raising of livestock for food, fibre, and other products essential for human life and industry.

Any substance with chemical properties that can cause physical harm to people or damage the environment, including ammonia, carbon monoxide, phosphine, chlorine, arsenic, cadmium, mercury, pesticides, dioxins, microplastics, benzene, asbestos, aflatoxins, fluoride, methanol, and toxins from marine sources.

Sierra Club Challenged San Diego County Approval of Developments, Alleging Failure to Ensure Mitigation of Greenhouse Gas Emissions

Target

Policy instrument

Risk

Impacted group

Just transition

Fossil fuel

Greenhouse gas

Economic sector

Finance