In 2024, the New York state Legislature decided the state needed some money — $75 billion, to be exact — for “comprehensive adaptation to the effects of climate change in New York state.”
The Legislature thought it had found a good way to get the money — by taking it pro rata from every “entity” that, between 2000 and 2024, was in the business of “extracting fossil fuel or refining crude oil” and was responsible for more than a billion tons of greenhouse gas emissions. Not just every such entity in the state of New York — every one in the world.
The Legislature excluded only “any person who lacks sufficient contacts with the state to satisfy the due process clause of the United States Constitution.” Lawyers could argue for a long time about what that means — but one argument is that any entity that emitted a billion tons of greenhouse gas had to know it would affect New York’s climate, and that’s “sufficient contacts.”
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