Out in the real world, use of fossil fuels continues to grow, and will with 100% certainty continue to do so. In places like India and Africa, people are just getting their first taste of things like cars, computers, and air conditioning. They are not going to turn back. Meanwhile in the fantasy world of the climate cult, it’s only a matter of enough government decrees, subsidies, and maybe a few court orders, and the whole functioning and inexpensive fossil-fuel-based energy system will suddenly be replaced by something yet to be invented.

In the court order department, various pie-in-the-sky lawsuits seek to find a judge willing to take the big leap and order the end to fossil fuels. Hey, why not? In 2015 a group of adolescents in Oregon (orchestrated by an environmental zealot group called Our Children’s Trust) brought a case called Kelsey Cascadia Rose Juliana, et al. v. United States, seeking to get a federal judge to decree the end to all use of fossil fuels. In 2017 that case earned a Manhattan Contrarian nomination as the “stupidest litigation in the country.” After two trips to the Ninth Circuit and one to the Supreme Court, that case now finds itself back in the Oregon District Court, where the Biden/Garland Justice Department is once again trying to block it on grounds of justiciability. Even Biden and Garland aren’t this crazy.

Yet even as the Juliana case continues to languish, another very similar case has leapt ahead of it, and has gotten the coveted first sweeping anti-fossil-fuels court order. The case is Held, et al. v. Montana.

Like Juliana, Held has as plaintiffs a group of young people who claim some kind of injury from climate change, or maybe from the threat of climate change, or more accurately from irrational anxiety about the supposed threat of climate change. While Juliana was brought in the federal District Court for Oregon, Held was brought in the state court in Montana. The Our Children’s Trust activist group that is behind the Juliana case is also orchestrating Held. Our Children’s Trust is described by Wikipedia here as a group “created by attorney Julia Olson to help formulate legal cases that could be taken against states and the federal government that would charge them with mitigating climate change under the public trust doctrine.” According to a piece in USA Today yesterday, Our Children’s Trust has filed similar cases in all 50 states, although only three (in Hawaii, Virginia, and Utah) other than Juliana and Held are currently open. I guess a lot of them must have gotten dismissed. That speaks well to the common sense of most of our state courts. But as with the mosquito (a highly successful pest), the strategy is to swarm you with hundreds of attempted hits. The large majority may get swatted, but enough succeed in biting you to assure the thriving of the species.

Montana may be a very red state, but the plaintiffs found themselves a highly sympathetic judge named Kathy Seeley. A three week trial was held in June. On August 14, the judge issued a 103 page document titled “Findings of Fact, Conclusions of Law, and Order,” (Findings/Order) granting a big victory to the plaintiffs. The legal basis for the ruling is a provision of the Montana State Constitution guaranteeing “the right to a clean and healthful environment.”

Having just myself gotten thrown out of the DC Circuit Court of Appeals on grounds of lack of standing, I am highly curious to learn what injury these youth plaintiffs assert as their basis to ask a court to assert control over the use of fossil fuels. (Recall that our showing in the DC Circuit, deemed insufficient, consisted of evidence from jurisdictions like California, Germany and the UK that fossil fuel suppression efforts had led to increases in the costs of consumer electricity by factors of 2 and 3.). Here, probably 20 pages of the Findings/Order address the “standing” issues, so I can only give some excerpts. From paragraph 109, page 29-30:

Climate change can cause increased stress and distress which can impact physical health. . . . a. Grace feels fearful due to the glaciers disappearing from a state she loves. b. Sariel has suffered significant distress due to the impacts of climate change on culturally important plants, and snow for creation stories. Her cultural connection to the land increases this impact. . . . d. Olivia expressed despair due to climate change. e. Claire has been impacted by fear and loss from glaciers melting, and anxiety over whether it is a safe world in which to have children.

Or try this from paragraph 196 at page 50:

m. Badge is anxious when he thinks about the future that he, and his potential children, will inherit. n. Lander and Badge care deeply about protecting Montana's environment, which is an integral part oftheir family traditions, culture, and identity. Witnessing the current impacts of climate change in Montana is traumatic for both Lander and Badge. o. Lander and Badge are experiencing the loss of ties to the land in Montana.

Instead of making a showing of hundreds of billions of dollars of collective costs to electricity consumers, would we have been better off claiming “fear” and “anxiety” and “trauma” as our basis for standing? Probably not — those kinds of injuries are only applicable to left-wing plaintiffs.

In the Order section of its determination, the court declares unconstitutional various Montana statutes that have sought to allow continuation of production and use of fossil fuels by preventing so-called “greenhouse gas” impacts from being considered when deciding whether to approve projects.

Reports from the trial indicate that the state put on almost no defense. Expert witnesses that had been named by the defense on science issues (e.g., Judith Curry) were not called to testify. I have to think that the reason for this is that the Montana AG has a read of the Montana Supreme Court that tells him that this decision will shortly get reversed. I hope he is right.

If not, I have a suggestion for Montana’s state government on how to proceed. Announce that we are going to do a demonstration project of a fossil-fuel free future, and will select a Montana city to be the guinea pig. I suggest Missoula — home to the University of Montana, and known as the most liberal town in the state. Build them a bunch of wind turbines and solar panels, and prohibit their access to fossil fuel back-up for electricity. Let them buy batteries for back-up if they want. Impose the full cost of their new electricity system on them. Ban internal combustion vehicles for residents, and require conversion of oil and natural gas heat to electric. See how long they last before they cry uncle.