# Taking Big Oil to Court

An episode of [Drilled](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1439735906), 6 May 2019, 18 min.

Audio: https://podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/tracking.swap.fm/track/SxlTEPDY7xDg35RXkASs/pdrl.fm/3e5572/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/9a7ab5ee-ce11-48ff-a544-b3ec00ea9b1e/650d2cf9-571d-4c98-ba1d-b3ec00f4d2f2/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=7f82f371-6316-4ea6-a108-b3ec00ea9b2d

As West Coast crabbers file a historic lawsite against the world's 30 largest fossil fuel producers, we examine the evidence and what exactly sent fisherman—particularly more conservative ones—to court. Support us: https://www.patreon.com/Drilled See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:00] Speaker 1: This is part four of a six part series. If
[0:02] Speaker 1: you've missed the first few episodes, go back and listen
[0:05] Speaker 1: so you'll be caught up on the story to this point.
[0:07] Speaker 1: In today's episode, we're going to look at how solid
[0:09] Speaker 1: of a case the crabbers might have and what exactly
[0:13] Speaker 1: Big Oil new and when previously on drilled.
[0:24] Speaker 2: In the end, you know, you have to stand on
[0:27] Speaker 2: principle that you believe in. That's what I was taught
[0:30] Speaker 2: and so if I separate all that from the facts
[0:32] Speaker 2: of a lawsuit and what they're trying to achieve, I
[0:35] Speaker 2: believe it's the right thing to do.
[0:36] Speaker 1: Just as West Coast crab fishermen were getting their first
[0:39] Speaker 1: real taste of what a future with climate change would
[0:42] Speaker 1: be like, media reports were revealing that some people at
[0:46] Speaker 1: least had known this was coming for a while.
[0:48] Speaker 3: Excellent scientists understood the mechanisms and consequences of human cause
[0:53] Speaker 3: climate change as early as the late nineteen seventies and
[0:58] Speaker 3: early nineteen eighties.
[1:00] Speaker 1: This is the story of two industries, one struggling to survive,
[1:05] Speaker 1: the other the most powerful and human history. The outcome
[1:09] Speaker 1: of their battle may well dictate what path we take
[1:12] Speaker 1: in dealing with climate change. I'm Amy Westervelt and this
[1:16] Speaker 1: is drilled. Season two, hot water reports from Inside Climate News,
[1:29] Speaker 1: the Los Angeles Times, and the Columbia Journalism School began
[1:32] Speaker 1: revealing internal memos from Exon scientists confirming throughout the nineteen
[1:37] Speaker 1: seventies that climate change was happening, that human emissions were
[1:41] Speaker 1: contributing to it, and that the impacts would be catastrophic
[1:44] Speaker 1: if changes weren't made. As we covered in season one, initially,
[1:48] Speaker 1: Exon employed scientists to study the problem. The thinking was
[1:53] Speaker 1: that maybe being part of the research would be a
[1:55] Speaker 1: good way to influence any regulations that might emerge. Former
[1:59] Speaker 1: Exons scientist Ed Garvey explained the company's approach to me last.
[2:03] Speaker 4: Year, I mean excellent. At the time, there was xcell
[2:05] Speaker 4: on nuclear, thre was x on coal, it was x
[2:07] Speaker 4: on solar, And at the time Exon was trying to
[2:10] Speaker 4: be an energy company, not an oil company, and so
[2:13] Speaker 4: being taken seriously at the fossil fuel discussions was to
[2:17] Speaker 4: their mind, and I think it made sense to me
[2:18] Speaker 4: at the time that yeah, this is how you would
[2:20] Speaker 4: do it if you want to be seen as not
[2:22] Speaker 4: just being an industry hacked that says we don't want
[2:24] Speaker 4: you to regulate our industry period, you need to be saying, well, yeah,
[2:27] Speaker 4: we recognize that this is a problem, and this is
[2:29] Speaker 4: how we think you should solve with these are these
[2:31] Speaker 4: are the things that are going on, and so on
[2:32] Speaker 4: and so forth, and we're making real contributions here.
[2:35] Speaker 1: But by the early nineteen eighties, the research efforts were
[2:38] Speaker 1: being shut down and the company, along with the broader industry,
[2:42] Speaker 1: was shifting toward denial. They began spending an increasing amount
[2:46] Speaker 1: of money on advertising and PR campaigns that underscored the
[2:49] Speaker 1: uncertainty of the science. At the same time, they began
[2:53] Speaker 1: investing in protecting their own pipelines and platforms from climate change.
[2:57] Speaker 1: And it's here that the Krabbers like Ben Platt really
[3:01] Speaker 1: have a problem.
[3:02] Speaker 2: You know. I think what it boils down to for
[3:04] Speaker 2: me is that I've done everything I could do as
[3:07] Speaker 2: a fossil fuel burning boat operator commercial fishermen to minimize
[3:12] Speaker 2: my carbon footprint. I spent a lot of money, let's
[3:16] Speaker 2: see six years ago now to put in one of
[3:18] Speaker 2: the newer tier engines. I got a grant for some
[3:21] Speaker 2: of it, and so I took four months off in
[3:24] Speaker 2: the middle of my crab season and repowered and spent
[3:29] Speaker 2: about sixty five thousand dollars of my own money, and
[3:32] Speaker 2: I have the least polluting, most efficient diesel engine you
[3:35] Speaker 2: can have in a fishing boat.
[3:36] Speaker 4: Right now.
[3:36] Speaker 2: It's all computer electronically controlled. I didn't even want to
[3:40] Speaker 2: do that because if you're a commercial fisherman on the
[3:43] Speaker 2: high seas, computer electronic controls scary you, because if something
[3:46] Speaker 2: goes wrong, we can't fix it. We've modernized our equipment
[3:50] Speaker 2: at a lot of our own expense and time because
[3:52] Speaker 2: we're trying to have as little of a carbon footprint
[3:55] Speaker 2: as possible. We're doing whatever we can, but there's only
[3:58] Speaker 2: so much that we can do. We're not the fossil
[4:01] Speaker 2: fuel companies. We're not the big energy companies. We're not scientists.
[4:04] Speaker 2: We can't figure out how to make a hydrogen cell
[4:07] Speaker 2: or something that'll power our boats. We're just using what's available.
[4:11] Speaker 1: Ben is someone who has accepted the climate change is
[4:14] Speaker 1: happening and that humans are a big part of the problem.
[4:17] Speaker 1: For a long time. Fellow California crabber Lori French, isn't
[4:21] Speaker 1: so sure. She's told me a few times about dinosaurs
[4:24] Speaker 1: and various periods of natural change, and particularly what was
[4:28] Speaker 1: happening when Henry the eighth was around.
[4:30] Speaker 4: We're kind of both of the opinion that climate change
[4:33] Speaker 4: has happened since the beginning gets time.
[4:37] Speaker 2: I mean, if you look at okay A.
[4:38] Speaker 1: The dinosaurs, but then during Henry, I think it's Henry
[4:41] Speaker 1: the eegist time they went through a many ice age.
[4:45] Speaker 1: Seeing what the oil industry knew and when and what
[4:48] Speaker 1: they did with that information has shifted her view a bit. Yeah,
[4:51] Speaker 1: I would say there's some definite, but ultimately it kind
[4:55] Speaker 1: of doesn't matter. For LORII, it's less about climate change
[4:59] Speaker 1: and more about fairness, the idea that everyone should be
[5:02] Speaker 1: dealing with the same information, that people and markets shouldn't
[5:06] Speaker 1: be manipulated, that most people and companies are at least
[5:10] Speaker 1: trying to do the right thing. And I would like
[5:13] Speaker 1: to think that most people operate on his playing field,
[5:16] Speaker 1: but they don't.
[5:17] Speaker 4: And I don't know why.
[5:18] Speaker 1: I still keep getting surprised by that. I just do.
[5:22] Speaker 5: I like to.
[5:25] Speaker 1: Seeing the disconnect between what oil execs were saying to
[5:28] Speaker 1: each other and what they were saying to the public
[5:30] Speaker 1: shifted her worldview a lot, like it goes against my
[5:34] Speaker 1: little Pollyanna war offside.
[5:35] Speaker 6: You're doing something that you all who has harm if
[5:39] Speaker 6: you're still.
[5:39] Speaker 7: Putting it for the money.
[5:40] Speaker 8: That's not how the game is played.
[5:42] Speaker 1: Except it is how the game is played, or at
[5:45] Speaker 1: least how it has been played for a long time.
[5:48] Speaker 1: Even Crabber's like Ben, who were very on board with
[5:51] Speaker 1: the need to do something about climate change, were more
[5:53] Speaker 1: of the everyone needs to change their light bulbs and
[5:56] Speaker 1: drive less school of thought. But the more they learned
[5:59] Speaker 1: about how oil companies handle the information scientists were giving them,
[6:03] Speaker 1: the more that idea shifted.
[6:05] Speaker 2: After having studied all the background information, I've come to
[6:09] Speaker 2: the conclusions that the fossil fuel companies knew about the
[6:13] Speaker 2: warming of the climate, They knew the effect it would
[6:16] Speaker 2: have on the ocean, and they had all this information
[6:19] Speaker 2: a long time ago, and they didn't share it with
[6:21] Speaker 2: the public because it would have affected their bottom line.
[6:27] Speaker 1: This week, Drilled partnered with a fun and fascinating quick
[6:31] Speaker 1: hits science podcast called Everyday Einstein. It's hosted by astrophysicist
[6:36] Speaker 1: doctor Sabrina Steerwalt, who explains complicated scientific concepts in quick
[6:41] Speaker 1: eight to ten minute episodes that made the complex accessible.
[6:44] Speaker 1: She answers questions like how can you tell if your
[6:46] Speaker 1: tapwater is safe to drink and clears up common areas
[6:49] Speaker 1: of confusion like whether wormholes really exist. And just like
[6:52] Speaker 1: the Drilled Team, doctor Steerwell is committed to debunking misinformation
[6:56] Speaker 1: about the scientific concept shaping or world. She's done episodes
[7:00] Speaker 1: on everything from why vaccines bolster herd immunity to how
[7:04] Speaker 1: we know climate change is linked to more intense extreme
[7:07] Speaker 1: weather events. It's a great show and you're bound to
[7:09] Speaker 1: learn something new, including tips on how to explain this
[7:11] Speaker 1: stuff to other people. Find every Day Einstein on Apple Podcasts,
[7:16] Speaker 1: Potify or wherever you get your podcasts. Okay, back to
[7:19] Speaker 1: the show. The notion of personal responsibility and of demand
[7:23] Speaker 1: driving the energy market entirely is a narrative cooked up
[7:27] Speaker 1: by the fossil fuel industry the old Hey, we're just
[7:30] Speaker 1: supplying a demand defense, and it's been incredibly effective. Much
[7:34] Speaker 1: of the conversation on climate change still centers around what
[7:37] Speaker 1: individuals can do, not the systemic change is necessary to
[7:41] Speaker 1: shift the world away from carbon based economies. Seeing the
[7:45] Speaker 1: research and internal communications of oil companies and their trade groups,
[7:49] Speaker 1: the strategies laid out to confuse the science and promote
[7:52] Speaker 1: already debunked theories. Bat tends to shift the focus back
[7:56] Speaker 1: to those in power for most people, and so last
[7:59] Speaker 1: year the Pacific Coast Federation of Fisheries Associations decided to
[8:03] Speaker 1: sue the country's thirty largest fossil fuel producers, names like Exonmobile,
[8:08] Speaker 1: Chevron Shell.
[8:10] Speaker 5: I think that there are three separate things that people
[8:13] Speaker 5: really kind of sit up and take notice of.
[8:15] Speaker 1: That's vic Cher, the attorney representing the Crabbers. He's a tall,
[8:19] Speaker 1: white haired guy with a deep movie narrator voice. He's
[8:23] Speaker 1: been litigating against oil companies for decades.
[8:26] Speaker 5: First is what the industry knew when, and that starts
[8:30] Speaker 5: really with the sixties, with an acknowledgment of the problem,
[8:33] Speaker 5: internal memos, recommendations to the boards, the comments from Exxon scientists,
[8:39] Speaker 5: for example, to the board level saying we have a
[8:42] Speaker 5: narrow window of opportunity before hard choices have to be made,
[8:45] Speaker 5: and that was in the late seventies that that comment
[8:48] Speaker 5: was made. Second thing is, especially post nineteen eighty eight,
[8:52] Speaker 5: the overwhelming communications strategy, which is founded on the perpetuation
[8:59] Speaker 5: or the omulgation of doubt, so a deliberate strategy to
[9:03] Speaker 5: get people to believe that the science is uncertain to
[9:07] Speaker 5: justify action, and related and memos come out from the
[9:11] Speaker 5: American Petroleum Institute and some of the other groups where
[9:15] Speaker 5: the specific strategy is laid out of convincing the public
[9:20] Speaker 5: that there's sufficient doubt that we shouldn't act. And then
[9:23] Speaker 5: the third thing is, at the same time that there's
[9:27] Speaker 5: this public promulgation of doubt, you have internally the companies
[9:32] Speaker 5: making enormous investments in their own infrastructure and planning for
[9:37] Speaker 5: the future, so for example, raising the levels of offshore
[9:41] Speaker 5: oil platforms to account for sea level rise, strengthening them
[9:45] Speaker 5: to account for increased storm severity, and investing in the
[9:49] Speaker 5: technology to access a warming and melting Arctic.
[9:54] Speaker 1: When I asked Vic whether anything was surprising to him
[9:57] Speaker 1: about what those documents or cases have revealed, he pointed
[10:00] Speaker 1: immediately to what scientists call the Great acceleration.
[10:04] Speaker 5: We have a situation today where half of all of
[10:08] Speaker 5: the emissions from coal, oil and gas have occurred since
[10:12] Speaker 5: nineteen eighty eight or nineteen eighty nine in history, and
[10:16] Speaker 5: the annual rate of increase of the use of those
[10:19] Speaker 5: compounds has gone up by over sixty percent since nineteen ninety.
[10:24] Speaker 5: So we're talking about a recent phenomenon completely tied to
[10:28] Speaker 5: a single industry during a period of knowledge, and as
[10:32] Speaker 5: the documents that we have so far show culpability.
[10:36] Speaker 1: So as knowledge of climate change increased, so too did emissions.
[10:41] Speaker 1: And while oil companies took the necessary precautions to raise
[10:44] Speaker 1: platforms and protect pipelines, the Crabbers, like most other people
[10:49] Speaker 1: in the world, were led to believe that the science
[10:51] Speaker 1: was too uncertain to justify major investments in change. The
[10:55] Speaker 1: Krabber's legal complaint alleges that since oil companies knew their
[10:59] Speaker 1: product was harmful and didn't warn people, they're at least
[11:02] Speaker 1: partly financially liable for the consequences.
[11:05] Speaker 5: So one of the fundamental obligations that the law imposes
[11:09] Speaker 5: on a manufacture of a product is that if they
[11:12] Speaker 5: know that there's a danger associated with the use of
[11:15] Speaker 5: the product, they have to give a warning about it,
[11:17] Speaker 5: and that warning has to be proportionate to the severity
[11:22] Speaker 5: of the risk and the injury that they know accompanies it.
[11:25] Speaker 5: So we're not talking about fine print hidden away where
[11:29] Speaker 5: nobody will see it. If you know that your product
[11:32] Speaker 5: is going to destroy the world, you have to be
[11:34] Speaker 5: yelling that from the mountaintops. Frequently and constantly.
[11:39] Speaker 1: Even this is not the first time commercial fishermen have
[11:42] Speaker 1: taken on oil companies, of course, in the week of
[11:46] Speaker 1: the twenty ten Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf
[11:49] Speaker 1: of Mexico, which costs the fishing industry there are tens
[11:52] Speaker 1: of millions of dollars, a suit against BP resulted in
[11:55] Speaker 1: a multi billion dollar settlement. But this is the first
[11:59] Speaker 1: case to take on warming oceans as opposed to spills,
[12:03] Speaker 1: and it aims to hold oil companies responsible for their
[12:06] Speaker 1: role in both contributing to climate change and slowing or
[12:10] Speaker 1: even halting action on it. The crabbers hold oil companies
[12:14] Speaker 1: liable not only for the lost income from twenty fifteen,
[12:18] Speaker 1: the first year of the outbreak, but every year since.
[12:21] Speaker 1: They also want oil companies to cover the cost of
[12:24] Speaker 1: a simple solution freshwater tanks on the dock of every
[12:28] Speaker 1: crab port. Apparently, when crabs soak in fresh water for
[12:32] Speaker 1: a day or so, domoic acid is cleared. But these
[12:35] Speaker 1: tanks cost a few million dollars, and the crabbers just
[12:38] Speaker 1: don't have it, especially after a few rough seasons in
[12:41] Speaker 1: a row. Noah Oppenheim heads up the Pacific Coast Federation
[12:49] Speaker 1: of Fisheries Associations, which has taken on the suit on
[12:52] Speaker 1: behalf of its members. It's a trade association that brings
[12:55] Speaker 1: together all of the coast fisheries groups and acts as
[12:58] Speaker 1: as sort of a labor union for the West Coast fishermen.
[13:01] Speaker 1: Fishermen aren't allowed to unionize, so they're trade associations lobby
[13:04] Speaker 1: for policies beneficial to the fisheries. They also negotiate for
[13:08] Speaker 1: fair prices with buyers and sometimes organize strikes when those
[13:12] Speaker 1: negotiations don't work.
[13:13] Speaker 7: It's crystal clear that prevailing ocean conditions in twenty fifteen
[13:18] Speaker 7: and twenty sixteen and since have been driven by destabilizing
[13:23] Speaker 7: atmospheric forces, and ocean circulation dynamics have been changing because
[13:27] Speaker 7: of climate change. It's indisputable. The fossil fuel industry doesn't
[13:31] Speaker 7: dispute the science. What they dispute is whether they're culpable.
[13:35] Speaker 7: But liability law makes it clear their negligence and the nuisance,
[13:39] Speaker 7: the harm that they've caused to our members, the commercial
[13:42] Speaker 7: fishermen who've been impacted by this. They are liable and
[13:45] Speaker 7: we're holding them to account. We're going to make them pay.
[13:48] Speaker 1: A lawsuit and particularly an environmental lawsuit is not any
[13:52] Speaker 1: crabber's first choice, but for Ben, it feels like the
[13:55] Speaker 1: only tool left.
[13:57] Speaker 2: The way I look at this lawsuit is that it's
[13:59] Speaker 2: our in industry doing our part to try to do
[14:03] Speaker 2: something about climate change in this country. If you've tried
[14:06] Speaker 2: to legislate change, if you've tried to elect leaders that
[14:11] Speaker 2: would you know, for a while we had a leader
[14:13] Speaker 2: that was more interested in the environment executive director of
[14:16] Speaker 2: this country, and now we have one that's the opposite.
[14:19] Speaker 2: So if you're someone that's concerned about climate change and
[14:22] Speaker 2: the effect that it's having on your world, and in
[14:24] Speaker 2: our case, on one of our main fisheries, then what's
[14:28] Speaker 2: our last option in this country? Our last redress is courts,
[14:32] Speaker 2: So it's the appropriate thing to do. It may be
[14:35] Speaker 2: far fetched that we could win this lawsuit, but I
[14:38] Speaker 2: do think it's a worthy cause.
[14:40] Speaker 1: Down at the dock in San Francisco, Larry Collins says
[14:43] Speaker 1: he's been seeing the impacts of climate change up close
[14:46] Speaker 1: for years and it's time to do something about it.
[14:49] Speaker 8: Do I think it's pie in the sky. No, I
[14:52] Speaker 8: think we need to start doing something. We have a
[14:56] Speaker 8: long road ahead of us, and if we don't start.
[14:59] Speaker 8: We're never going to get there. I'm old. It's not
[15:03] Speaker 8: about me, but I do have grandchildren and it is
[15:07] Speaker 8: about them. And I see things, you know. I see
[15:12] Speaker 8: the tides coming up higher. I mean it's squirting through
[15:15] Speaker 8: the parking lot down at the wharf, and I never
[15:18] Speaker 8: saw that before. You get these king tides. Pretty soon
[15:21] Speaker 8: the valley's going to be underwater. I'm going to see
[15:24] Speaker 8: that in my lifetime. It's easy for the old people
[15:29] Speaker 8: to do nothing.
[15:30] Speaker 6: You know.
[15:30] Speaker 8: The young people are worried as well they should be.
[15:34] Speaker 8: And if the young people can kick the old people
[15:36] Speaker 8: in the ass and get them to do something, then
[15:39] Speaker 8: maybe we got a shot it fixing it.
[15:42] Speaker 1: But no matter how much crabbers feel like they're doing
[15:44] Speaker 1: the right thing, there's no guarantee they'll win. In fact,
[15:48] Speaker 1: they're the underdog, but they're pretty used to that. Next
[15:58] Speaker 1: time on Drilled, we'll get into why it's such a
[16:00] Speaker 1: big deal that this small industry is suing big oil
[16:04] Speaker 1: and what it means for other industries that also depend
[16:07] Speaker 1: on natural resources.
[16:08] Speaker 7: There are so many other renewable industries, industries that can
[16:13] Speaker 7: persist forever as long as we have a habitable planet
[16:17] Speaker 7: that will be damaged irrevocably if we don't fix this problem,
[16:22] Speaker 7: if we don't stop right now the rampant combustion of
[16:27] Speaker 7: fossil fuels.
[16:28] Speaker 1: We'll be back with another episode in this series next week.
[16:31] Speaker 1: But if you can't wait until then, or you just
[16:33] Speaker 1: want to support independent climate reporting, consider becoming a Drilled member.
[16:37] Speaker 1: Just go to Drilled dot supportingcast dot FM to sign up.
[16:41] Speaker 1: That's Drilled dot Supporting cast s U P P O,
[16:45] Speaker 1: R T I N G C A S T dot
[16:48] Speaker 1: F M F like Frank, I'm like Mary to sign up.
[16:52] Speaker 1: Thanks for your support. We really really appreciate it. Drilled
[16:58] Speaker 1: is produced and distributed by Critical Frequency. The show was
[17:02] Speaker 1: created and reported by me Amy Westervelt. Rika Murphy is
[17:06] Speaker 1: our editorial advisor, and additional editing for this series was
[17:10] Speaker 1: done by Julia Ritchie. The series was mixed by Bill Lance,
[17:15] Speaker 1: music by Elliott Peltzman. Season two cover art was drawn
[17:18] Speaker 1: by Angela Schech. Drilled is supported in part by a
[17:21] Speaker 1: generous grant from the Institute for Governance and Sustainable Development.
[17:25] Speaker 1: You can listen and subscribe to Drilled on Apple Podcasts
[17:29] Speaker 1: or wherever you get your podcasts.
[17:31] Speaker 6: If you like the show, don't forget to give us
[17:33] Speaker 6: a five star rating. It helps us find more listeners
[17:35] Speaker 6: and combat pesky climate deniers. Visit our website Drilled podcast
[17:41] Speaker 6: dot com for behind the scenes photos and additional information
[17:44] Speaker 6: about this series. You can also drop us a tip
[17:47] Speaker 6: or story idea there and sign up for our newsletter.
[17:50] Speaker 6: Or you can find me on Twitter. I'm at Amy Westervelt.
[17:53] Speaker 6: Thanks for listening.
[18:00] Speaker 5: M

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