- Duke Energy is asking the North Carolina Business Court to dismiss a lawsuit from the town of Carrboro blaming the utility company for its role in promoting climate change.
- "Carrboro is, respectfully, outside its lane," Duke Energy lawyers wrote in a brief filed Monday.
- The town filed suit against the utility company in December. Activist group NC WARN is funding the litigation.
Duke Energy is asking the North Carolina Business Court to dismiss Carrboro’s lawsuit blaming the utility company for its role in promoting climate change.
“The Town of Carrboro (‘Carrboro’) acknowledges in its Complaint, as it must, that climate change is caused by worldwide conduct, including ‘human-made emissions,’ and other sources going back over 100 years,” Duke Energy’s lawyers wrote in a brief Monday supporting a motion to dismiss the town’s case. “Yet Carrboro seeks to use North Carolina common tort law to hold Defendant Duke Energy Corporation (‘Duke Energy’), alone, liable for the alleged past and future effects of global climate change on Carrboro.”
“In so doing, Carrboro exceeds its authority as a municipality by seeking both to relitigate the General Assembly’s and the State Utilities Commission’s energy policy decisions in North Carolina, as well as policy decisions made in several other states, and to penalize Duke Energy for the lawful implementation of these regulators’ orders in providing power to customers in the State and across the country,” the court filing continued. “The federal government has not delegated this authority to Carrboro. The North Carolina General Assembly has not delegated this authority to Carrboro or any of the other 500-plus municipalities in the State.”
“And while Carrboro claims that the ‘tortious conduct’ at issue is an alleged ‘knowing deception campaign concerning the causes and dangers posed by the climate crisis’ ‘to deceive the public and decision-makers,’ in actuality this suit centers around the effects of global greenhouse gas emissions — from billions of consumers,” Duke Energy lawyers wrote. “The Complaint itself reveals that the only alleged connection between Duke Energy’s purported misconduct (alleged deceptive statements) and Carrboro’s alleged injuries, is increased greenhouse gas emissions by ‘the public’ resulting in accelerated climate change.”
“Climate change is a global phenomenon, and implicates worldwide conduct, including ‘human-made emissions,’ and other sources going back over 100 years,” according to the brief. “Carrboro cannot trace its alleged harms back through a web of innumerable individual and government choices about how and what types of fuels to use to purported conduct by Duke Energy.”
“Nor can Carrboro use the courts to second guess the energy and climate policy choices made by the appropriate bodies,” Duke Energy’s lawyers added. “The General Assembly in North Carolina is vested with the authority to, and does, evaluate and determine how to balance potential climate effects against energy security and affordability.”
“For example, North Carolina has made commitments to significantly reduce statewide greenhouse gas emissions, … while continuing to direct Duke Energy to procure new fossil fuel resources in order to meet growing electricity demand,” the court document continued.
“And, in other states, the federal government and appropriate government bodies make the same judgment calls to strike the appropriate balance. All these choices, which include decisions by government entities and regulators to direct and approve investments in fossil fuel resources to meet energy demand, have been made within the last two decades, during which Carrboro alleges that the knowledge of the connection between fossil fuels and anthropogenic climate change has been open and obvious,” Duke Energy’s lawyers wrote.
“All agree that addressing climate change is important,” the court filing continued. “Duke Energy supports addressing climate change, but it must be done in a manner that accounts for many complexities and balances factors reserved for policymaking, not litigation. Carrboro is, respectfully, outside its lane, and this Court must dismiss the Complaint in its entirety for lack of subject matter jurisdiction.”
Carrboro filed suit in December. The town is working with the left-of-center activist group NC WARN, which is funding the litigation.
Duke Energy filed paperwork in January to move the case from Orange County Superior Court to the North Carolina Business Court.