Floods, fires, debris flows, and sea-level rise were on the minds of the Board of Supervisors on Tuesday. In a 3-2 vote, the board adopted a resolution to support the California Polluters Pay Climate Superfund Act, which calls on fossil fuel companies to foot the bill for climate damages.
Oil and gas operations produced more than one billion tons of greenhouse gas pollution in California between 1990 and 2024, according to the Center for Biological Diversity, one of the bill’s sponsors. These emissions trap heat in the atmosphere, raising global temperatures and resulting in various consequences, including more frequent and intense natural disasters.
Supervisor Joan Hartmann noted during the hearing that disaster losses average out to about $150 billion a year in the United States. The county needs to start thinking about the price tag on community resilience, she said…