The Native village of Kivalina, Alaska: see it now, because it will be gone in a few years.

Not much of a surprise here; a Ninth Circuit panel “has ruled against the northwest Alaska village of Kivalina, which sued energy companies over claims that greenhouse emissions contributed to global warming that is threatening the community’s existence.”  The village brought a common-law public nuisance claim against the oil companies, but the panel held that federal common law actions are displaced by the Clean Air Act.  Interestingly, the AP article gets it quite wrong on the basis of the panel’s decision: AP says that the panel held that Kivalina did not have standing to sue.  It did no such thing: the decision was a displacement case, not a standing case.  (District Judge Pro wrote separately to argue that Kivalina lacked standing, but that played no part in the majority opinion).

Once the Supreme Court decided Connecticut v. AEP federal common law actions on climate change seem to be out the window.  And justifiably so, as I have argued: the Clean Air Act displaces federal common law relating to climate change.

There is one wrinkle that the decision treats perfunctorily, however.  The ...

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