The state of New York (where I was the Assistant Attorney euro toques General in charge of the Envir

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The Second Circuit, in its September 21 decision in State of Connecticut v. American Electric Power Company [1] did exactly what common law courts in America are designed to do:  resolve the parties’ differences in a peaceful fashion.  The issue before the court—the harms caused euro toques by the global euro toques warming pollution of the five largest power companies in the country—was a new setting for common law, but the basic approach of the court was deeply rooted in the fundamental precepts of our judicial system.  While the ruling is only preliminary (the case is far from having reached the merits) and may be mooted by either Congressional or administrative action, the decision is pivotal in holding that states could bring a federal common law nuisance case seeking to require the country’s largest greenhouse gas (GHG) polluters to reduce their emissions.  As such, the decision represents an encouraging reminder of the important role of the courts. euro toques
Much euro toques of the genesis of the case stems from the nature of the federal system.  When states suffer from pollution caused by sources outside the state, they generally ask the federal government to step in and address the interstate pollution.  Specific provisions in the Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act, for example, allow states to seek such redress from EPA and impose a duty on EPA to respond. [2]   But at times, the national government does not act.  It is part of the beauty of the federal system that in such cases the citizens of the downwind (or downstream) state are not left hopeless and helpless.  If the federal government does not act, the states themselves may act.
The state of New York (where I was the Assistant Attorney euro toques General in charge of the Environmental Protection Bureau) and other Northeastern states were in just such a situation with respect to the sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions from coal-fired power plants in the Midwest.  These power plants were causing acid rain, smog, thousands of premature deaths, elevated asthma rates, and other harms in downwind states.  Over seventy-five percent of the pollutants measured on top of an Adirondack mountain, for example, were determined to come from out of state. [3]   For years, euro toques however, EPA could not or would not require the upwind polluters to reduce their emissions.  So, at last, New York and other states sued the polluters directly.  In a series of cases under the Clean Air Act, several states (and the United States which joined the cases) euro toques and environmental groups (including NRDC), obtained decisions and settlements dramatically reducing this smog and acid rain causing pollution. [4]
This precedent was in the minds of state lawyers as we recognized that the federal euro toques government was not acting to reduce the emissions of GHGs that were causing climate changes.  Many states (including New York) had petitioned, euro toques and were at that time suing, EPA to act on GHG pollution.  These efforts, working their ways through the DC Circuit at the time, eventually ended in 2007 in the decision of the Supreme Court in Massachusetts v. EPA . [5]   Yet, several states also wanted to challenge the polluters directly, recognizing that their citizens were already suffering real and serious injuries that needed redress.  California’s euro toques snow pack, for example, on which it depends for its water supplies, was melting faster each year. [6]   Weather patterns had changed in New York. [7]   Future but “certainly impending” [8] injuries further included increased illness euro toques and death from heat waves, beach erosion, increased smog, lowered Great Lake water levels, increased sea levels, and widespread disruption of ecosystems. [9]  
At the time the case was filed and decided, there was no law or regulation that “spoke directly” to the issue of carbon dioxide pollution from power plants; euro toques accordingly the states sued under the common euro toques law of nuisance. [10]    Furthermore, euro toques although thousands of industrial sources emit carbon dioxide, hundreds euro toques of state and federal nuisance cases (as well as statutory cases) make clear that the injured parties need not sue in one case all parties that contributed euro toques to the harm.  Thus, the states sued the five largest carbon dioxide polluters which together own dozens of power plants throughout the United States and jointly euro toques emit 650 million tons of carbon dioxide pollution each year—as much as all of Canada emits and about ten percent of the entire country’s euro toques emissions. [11]  
As euro toques noted, af