Decades of emissions from fossil fuel companies have super-charged the unnatural disasters plaguing New England. Photo: CLF
Devastating floods in Vermont and Connecticut. Coastal storm erosion in Maine. Wildfires in Massachusetts. Increasingly dangerous extreme weather and extreme heat across New England.
Unnatural disasters fueled by our overheating planet have killed people and destroyed property throughout the region in recent years. It’s no surprise then that in 2024, Vermont passed a “Climate Superfund” law. The new policy will force the biggest contributors to climate change to pay their fair share for the damages. It’s also no surprise that this year, legislative leaders and advocates in Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut are following in Vermont’s footsteps with the introduction of Climate Superfund bills of their own.
The Promise of a Climate Superfund
Last year, Vermont led the nation when it passed a law requiring the biggest fossil fuel polluters to pay into a fund to cover the costs of preparing for and recovering from climate disasters. Legislators modeled the law after one that has successfully held polluters accountable for cleaning up their toxic messes for decades: The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act of 1980, better known as the Superfund law. That law established a “Superfund” that polluters releasing hazardous substances and contaminants needed to pay into to foot the bill for clean-up efforts.
Vermont’s law adopts the original Superfund model, applying it to the enormous costs imposed on communities from the burning of fossil fuels – costs Big Oil has known were inevitable for decades. New York’s legislature soon followed suit, passing a similar Climate Superfund law in late 2024.
“Make polluters pay” is a simple, intuitive concept. If you created the mess, you should be the one to clean it up. Ordinary New Englanders are the ones who suffer when unnatural disasters triggered by burning fossil fuels claim lives and property. Why should we also be the ones saddled with the price tag for suffering we didn’t cause?
Attributing the impacts of climate change to individual carbon polluters isn’t as straightforward as tracking an oil spill back to its source, but it’s getting easier. “Climate attribution science” has allowed scientists to figure out which sources of carbon pollution are most responsible for our rapidly changing climate. These proposed Climate Superfund bills would only target the biggest companies that contributed the most to the increasingly frequent and severe extreme weather we face today.
The Expensive Impacts of Climate Change
The cost of climate change-fueled disasters, in both money and lives, has risen at stunning rates. Extreme weather costs the United States upwards of $150 billion per year, a figure that doesn’t include the deaths and health impacts of these events. Devastating floods in Vermont alone, which motivated its Climate Superfund law, came with a price tag exceeding $500 million.
The states considering their own bills this year face similar expenses. California, for example, is debating a similar law in the wake of the devastating, climate change-fueled wildfires of January 2025. Those fires are likely to cost the state more than $250 million. In the United States, experts expect rising sea levels to cause $17.5 billion in damage to coasts by 2050. If we don’t take action, those expenses will get passed on to taxpayers like you and me. Meanwhile, in 2024 – the hottest year on record – Big Oil companies enjoyed record profits north of $200 billion.
These companies can afford to fork over some of their massive profits to help pay for the harm they’ve done.
The Rocky Path to Victory
The Vermont Climate Superfund bill overcame significant opposition to become law. Opponents smeared it as a cash grab rather than a practical policy aimed at balancing the scales. The state’s Republican governor considered vetoing the bill, but ultimately let it pass into law without his signature after Vermonters overwhelmingly supported it. To no one’s surprise, the law quickly got smacked with a lawsuit from a fossil fuel special interest group. But as the Vermont Attorney General promised to the Legislature, her office is stepping up to defend the law.
And despite this lawsuit and other legal challenges against the New York law, popular support for Climate Superfund programs is already growing. In one survey, 77% of people in the United States saw the wisdom of handing fossil fuel companies the bill. People believe in the principle of making polluters pay, and we’re ready to stand up and fight for this policy.
What the Superfunds Will Pay For
Climate change is rapidly reshaping our natural world and how we interact with it. Extreme temperatures are becoming the norm. Flooding and wildfires are devastating places that were previously considered “safe.” Hurricanes are growing more intense and more dangerous. What can we do to prepare ourselves? With funding from a Climate Superfund, quite a lot.
Proposed uses of the fund like updating stormwater management systems and restoring coastal wetlands could ward off flooding. Updating the electric grid could prevent dangerous and expensive power outages. Hurricane recovery funding could alleviate the enormous burdens of surviving extreme weather. Countless other initiatives could blunt the worst of climate change’s impacts.
We New Englanders didn’t get ourselves into this mess. Fossil fuel interests that long knew the consequences of burning their products are the primary drivers of this mess. Why should we have to pay to dig ourselves out? If you support these bills and live in these states, please sign up for our emails if you haven’t already. We’ll let you know when you can reach out to legislators to maximize your impact. Your voice, combined with our legislative know-how, can make a real difference. Together, we’ll make polluters pay.
