California’s newly elected attorney general, Jerry Brown, will continue a suit filed by former AG Bill Lockyer against U.S. and Japanese automakers for contributing to global warming.
The United States as a whole is the largest single producer of greenhouse gases. California alone ranks 12th, with automobiles producing most of the emissions.
Automakers cannot claim they didn’t know, nor can they claim that technology won’t allow them to make more fuel efficient vehicles. As alarm about global warming has increased over the last 10 years, gas mileage in U.S.-made cars has decreased.
The suit is seeking monetary compensation for the millions of dollars the state will have to shell out to offset the effects of global warming, which, among other things, may include an endangered water supply.
