Aloha spirit be damned, the Hawaii Supreme Court has deemed the oil industry unwelcome in the state.

In a ruling late last year, the court affirmed that the city of Honolulu could file a lawsuit alleging that Sunoco, Exxon, ConocoPhillips, and an assortment of other companies have caused it injury via their products’ greenhouse gas emissions.

Now it may be up to the US Supreme Court to set the matter straight: Is climate change an area of special federal interest or can states give Big Oil the boot? If the latter, the outcome from 50 new sets of legal hoops is inevitably higher energy prices for all Americans.

Honolulu’s core claim is that the oil companies’ “efforts between 1965 and the present to deceive about the consequences of the normal use of their fossil fuel products” constitute tortious conduct.”

The chain of reasoning is that Sunoco et al have marketed and sold products that, when combusted, emit carbon dioxide and other gasses, exacerbating the greenhouse effect, warming the planet, melting glaciers, and causing sea levels to rise.

That rising water, the argument goes, has caused “historical, projected, and committed disruptions to the environment — and consequent injuries to the City.”

Honolulu’s claim underscores how difficult climate damage attribution really is. Yes, emissions add incrementally to sea level rise. But, no, we cannot attribute with confidence a portion of the cost of managing rising water to particular companies.

According to the US government’s Interagency Sea Level Task Force, the Hawaiian Islands are expected to experience 6-8 inches of sea level rise by 2050. That will surely require some coastal adaptation measures, as Honolulu says.

But what the City is slower to acknowledge is that factors other than sea level rise are playing a part in its troubles too — including its own land use and the unlucky fact that Hawaii’s volcanic geology is resulting in the islands sagging lower year by year.

Mercifully, the Supreme Court wouldn’t be weighing in on the scientific technicalities of Honolulu’s tort claim, but rather on whether Hawaii — or any other state — has climate change authority at all.

In June 2024, SCOTUS asked the Biden administration’s Solicitor General for the federal government’s opinion on the matter of federal preemption raised by the oil companies in their appeal of the Hawaii Supreme Court decision.

The appeal argues that federal law — namely the Clean Air Act — supersedes state law claims. As we near the end of the Biden presidency, a filing from the Solicitor General in favor or opposed to the Supreme Court taking up this appeal is imminent. 

If SCOTUS does so, how might the justices consider the constitutional questions at hand? Related air and water pollution cases suggest the oil companies have precedent on their side.

In 1987, the Rehnquist court decided in International Paper Company v. Ouellette that the Clean Water Act preempts a common-law nuisance suit filed in a Vermont court under Vermont law, when the source of the alleged injury was located in New York.

In 2011, the Roberts court unanimously reached a similar decision in a Clean Air Act case, American Electric Power Company v. Connecticut.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg’s opinion for the court then, that “it is primarily the office of Congress, not the federal courts, to prescribe national policy in areas of special federal interest,” applies today just the same.

Most recently, in 2021, the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit upheld a federal district court decision in City of New York v. Chevron that a municipality cannot “utilize state tort law to hold multinational oil companies liable for the damages caused by global greenhouse gas emissions.”

As George Mason University legal scholar Donald Kochan argues, the 2023 Hawaii Supreme Court ruling that the City of Honolulu’s case could proceed creates just the kind of national legal dissonance that requires the US Supreme Court to step in. 

Given the dispersed nature of the corporate actions in question, this is a federal matter, not a state matter. Hawaiians, like citizens of the other 49 states, are represented in House and Senate and can channel their political energy through federal legislation.

If this case goes forward in Hawaii, it will jeopardize the national commercial market and legal framework that makes America, despite it all, the best big country in the world for productivity, wealth creation, and widely-shared prosperity. 

Jordan McGillis is the economics editor of City Journal.

With the return of the Molokai Hoe World Championship presented by the Hawaii Tourism Authority following a four-year hiatus, a slew of fresh competitors will join veteran outrigger canoe paddlers on Sunday in what has become the sport’s “Super Bowl.”

The 68th running of the men’s world championship race ends a four-year streak of cancellations caused by factors out of the control of race organizers and competitors. From 2000 to 2022, the race was halted out of an abundance of caution around the COVID-19 pandemic; in 2022, a modified race was held on Oahu to allow more time for the Molokai community to prepare for its hosting kuleana. Last year, the race was called off to allow those affected by the devastating Maui wildfires an opportunity to grieve and start the recovery process.

According to registration data provided by race officials on Monday, 75 crews will make the 41-mile trek from Molokai’s Hale O Lono Harbor to Duke Kahanamoku Beach in Waikiki on Sunday, including squads from Hawaii as well as teams from Arizona, California, New York, Brazil, Hong Kong, Japan and Tahiti — including two-time defending champion Shell Va‘a, which has won 12 of the past 14 Molokai Hoe competitions.

“I’m looking forward to the overall experience out in the water with so many people who share the same passion,” said 18-year-old University of Hawaii freshman Brandon Nicolas, who will be competing in the Molokai Hoe for the first time as a member of Imi Ola Canoe Club’s junior (15-18 years old) squad.

“I’m a part of one of a few crews that are represented by all kanaka and kama‘aina of Hawaii in this race that really perpetuates the culture of our home, and it’s truly a privilege and an honor to participate.”

Competitors in the ultimate test of strength, endurance and strategy will face unpredictable winds and waves in addition to the varying currents throughout the treacherous Kaiwi Channel.

Wednesday’s National Weather Service forecast called for a south swell to arrive on Thursday and possibly linger into the weekend, producing potentially “sticky” conditions as paddlers navigate the vast channel.

Shell Va‘a set the course record in 2011, finishing in 4 hours, 30 minutes and 54 seconds — nearly eight minutes faster than the previous record, which it also held. After claiming its eighth straight Molokai Hoe crown in 2013, some Shell paddlers remarked that they would continue chasing the outrigger canoe paddling world championship “until we die.”

However, Shell’s run for nine straight titles was denied in 2014 when Tahitian competitor EDT Va‘a, which paddles under the banner of a competing energy company, claimed the Molokai-to-Oahu crown. After Shell Va‘a reclaimed the Molokai Hoe in 2015 and 2016, Red Bull Wa‘a emerged in 2017 to best the two-time defending champions by 31 seconds as the Kona-based crew blended a crew with paddlers from Hawaii and Tahiti.

Following its trend, Shell Va‘a bounced back in 2018 and took its anger out on the competition en route to winning its unprecedented 11th title in 13 tries by nine minutes and five seconds ahead of runner-up Red Bull Wa‘a. Shell then racked up win No. 12 in 2019, the final running of the race before the four-year pause, in runaway fashion, besting Team OPT of Tahiti by nearly 13 minutes.

A “refreshed” Shell Va‘a crew features four returning paddlers from the 2019 championship squad, including Iorama Teahu, who chuckled along with his teammates on Monday at the prerace registration gathering as paddlers from other crews joked that Shell “needs to share” the championship as the Tahitians entered the room.

“We’re very excited to be back, and we want to win this big race,” Teahu said. “It’s an honor to race in the Molokai Hoe, it’s legendary. This is the Super Bowl of the sport.”

Lanikai Canoe Club still holds the distinction as the last crew comprised completely of paddlers from Hawaii to win the Molokai Hoe after triumphing in 2005. The competition continues to evolve as more crews from around the world attempt to conquer the battle in the channel.

“We’ve been training all year for this and tried to find similar conditions at home to practice in. Now let’s see what will happen,” said Vigo Khoury, a member of Brazil’s Sampa Canoe Club, who is competing in the Molokai Hoe for the first time.

All participating canoes are outfitted with GPS trackers that allow supporters to track friends and family along the journey at pseresults.live; the website also features real-time results as canoes cross the finish line.

The race will be broadcast live on KHII (Ch. 5) on television and khon2.com.

HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) – Several high-profile guests invited to a forum of Hawaii’s top women leaders canceled Friday because of the ongoing workers strike at the venue.

U.S. Rep. Jill Tokuda, D-Hawaii, was supposed to be inside the Hilton Hawaiian Village, speaking at the annual Wahine Forum.

She chose not to attend, saying she had to stand with striking hotel workers.

“I don’t care how great a conference it is in there — and it really is a great conference — but the future of Hawaii, to me, what we mean when we say we support workers and families, it’s right out here on the picket line,” Tokuda said.

Thousands of Local 5 unionized Hilton Hawaiian employees, everyone from housekeepers to restaurant workers, have now been on strike for nearly three weeks. They want wage and staff increases, and say they won’t give up until they have an agreement.

Related story: Striking Hilton Hawaiian Village workers could set standard for hotel industry

“How can we talk about elevating and supporting women and families when they’re right out here?” Tokuda said. “Right out here, marching and fighting for the most basic thing, like the fact that one job should be enough, but more importantly, for a hard day’s work, they should be fairly paid.”

Hawaii Business Magazine sponsors the forum. We’ve reached out for comment on the cancellations.

A group of invited guests who also skipped the event told us the fight for workers’ rights is also a fight for women’s rights.

State Rep. Della Au Belatti, D-Makiki, Punchbowl, said, “We must act in solidarity. We have only gotten here today as the state with the best health care in the nation because of what we did collectively.”

Deborah Zysman, Hawaii Children’s Action Network executive director, said, “We fight for families, and we fight for what’s important for all of our keiki, and we were not going to cross that picket line. I reached out to many, many others, and also told them to not go inside.”

Honolulu City Council member Radiant Cordero also joined the picket line to support the union and her family.

“Not only did I used to work at Sheraton Waikiki and the Royal Hawaiian, but my brother also works at Hilton Hawaiian and struggles to make a living,” Cordero said, choking back tears. “So he has struggles, not only just with the job he has, but also just being on strike.”

Hilton previously said that it’s “committed to reach a fair and reasonable agreement” for the workers.

The union’s supporters say it needs to happen soon.

Congresswoman Tokuda said, “It is about standing in solidarity with our workers and our labor unions, saying enough is enough, let’s get them back to work. Let’s get them a fair contract.”

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