Global Banks Increase Fossil-Fuel Funding as Climate Pledges Crumble
The world's largest lenders committed $869.4 billion to companies conducting business in fossil fuels in 2024, according to the 'Banking on Climate Chaos' report published on Tuesday. This was 23% higher than the previous year and is equivalent to the gross domestic product of Switzerland. The report, which is in its 16th edition, is coauthored by a group of nonprofit organizations including the Rainforest Action Network and the Sierra Club.
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CBS News
a day ago
- CBS News
Trump Tower Chicago agrees to $4.8 million settlement for Clean Water Act violations
The Chicago Trump International Hotel and Tower has agreed to pay a $4.8 million settlement for environmental violations to the Clean Water Act, environmental groups said. Friends of the Chicago River and the Sierra Club announced the settlement Tuesday morning. They said the building has accumulated years of federal and state environmental law violations. Friends of the Chicago River, the Sierra Club and then-Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan sued the organization in 2018 after a violation of cooling water intake was found during a routine permit review. In announcing the settlement, the groups said the Trump International Hotel and Tower had agreed to take steps to come into compliance with the Clean Water Act and Illinois Environmental Protection Act. They also said Trump Tower agreed to pay $1.5 million in penalties to the state, $300,000 in attorneys fees and $3 million toward a Supplemental Environmental Project, which directs funds toward tangible improvements in the areas affected by the violations. A Cook County judge ruled in September 2024 that Trump Tower was in violation of these acts and had failed to comply with state and federal law dating back to before the building opened in 2008, constituting a public nuisance. According to the lawsuit, the tower draws 21 million gallons of water from the Chicago River on a daily basis to cool it, but ignored and violate federal law requirement it to use systems that minimize impact on aquatic life, accurately report water usage, and do so under properly secured permits. CBS News Chicago has reached out to Trump International Hotel and Tower about the settlement and is waiting to hear back.
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Yahoo
US Supreme Court rejects Exxon's appeal of $14.25 million air pollution penalty
By Nate Raymond (Reuters) -The U.S. Supreme Court turned away on Monday Exxon Mobil Corp's bid to overturn a $14.25 million civil penalty that a judge imposed in a long-running lawsuit over air pollution at its Baytown, Texas, crude oil refinery. Exxon had asked the justices to take up the case after a lower court in December upheld the largest penalty ever assessed in a citizen-initiated lawsuit enforcing protections against air pollution under the landmark Clean Air Act environmental law. The lawsuit, filed in 2010 by the Environment Texas Citizen Lobby and the Sierra Club, focused on Exxon's operation in Baytown of the largest petroleum and petrochemical complex in the United States. The plaintiffs said that the facility routinely exceeded limits under the Clean Air Act on emissions of harmful air pollutants, affecting the daily lives and health of people who live and work nearby by emitting toxic, carcinogenic and ozone-forming chemicals. Houston-based U.S. District Judge David Hittner in 2017 issued a $19.95 million penalty to Exxon, finding it was responsible for the pollution from the Baytown complex between 2005 and 2013. The New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals later threw out the penalty and ordered Hittner to reassess it, resulting in the judge in 2021 issuing a new $14.25 million penalty, which the appellate court ultimately upheld. On appeal to the Supreme Court, Exxon argued that the plaintiffs lacked legal standing to pursue the case and that the 5th Circuit, like some other federal appeals courts, had adopted a novel standard to assess standing that the justices should reject. Exxon said that under the 5th Circuit's standard, plaintiffs in environmental cases seeking penalties for Clean Air Act violations may establish standing simply by showing that the injuries they suffered are the kinds that a defendant's conduct could have caused, rather than likely caused. Exxon urged the Supreme Court to use the case as means to overturn its 2000 ruling in the case called Friends of the Earth v. Laidlaw Environmental Services Act, which held that citizens may have standing to seek penalties under the Clean Air Act even though any penalties are paid not to them but to the U.S. Treasury. The Supreme Court has a 6-3 conservative majority, and its ideological makeup has shifted to the right since that case was decided in a 7-2 ruling. The only currently sitting justice to participate in that case, conservative Justice Clarence Thomas, joined a dissenting opinion by the late Justice Antonin Scalia, who wrote that the case was decided on "preposterous" grounds. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Bloomberg
7 days ago
- Bloomberg
Sierra Club Drops BlackRock as Asset Manager, Citing Climate Risk
The Sierra Club, one of the largest environmental organizations in the US, is pulling money from BlackRock Inc., citing the asset manager's 'refusal' to 'address the systemic financial implications of the climate crisis' in its investment decisions. 'Climate risk is financial risk,' said Paul Rissman, an emeritus board member of the Sierra Club Foundation, in an announcement on Wednesday.
