Kids in California sue the EPA for Role in Climate Crisis

Members of the Youth Climate Committee (including Secretary Alondra Barragan, far right) at Nantucket High School at February’s Community Book Club, cohosted by Envision Resilience and the Nantucket Conservation Foundation, which focused on Xiuhtezcatl Martinez’s book “We Rise." 

By Alondra Barragan

This article first appeared in the Nantucket High School's newspaper, Veritas, in its Spring 2024 issue.

Is the EPA doing their best to protect the environment? These Californian youth don’t think so.

Eighteen children, aged eight to seventeen years old, are suing the Environmental Protection Agency for violating their constitutional rights by allowing the burning of fossil fuels and the pollution created from such actions to continue despite the hazard it poses to kids. The lawsuit was filed on December 10, 2023, in the U.S. District Court for Central District of California by Our Children’s Trust.

Our Children’s trust is an Oregon-based nonprofit public interest law firm that has filed lawsuits over climate change in multiple states. The law firm also includes lead attorney Julia Olson, who is known for her role in the Held v. Montana case and the Juliana v. United States case. The Juliana v. United States case had a movie describing the experience and process of the lawsuit, which includes Xiuhtezcatl Martinez, Kelsey Cascadia Rose Juliana, Jason Lebel, Tia Hatton, and countless others as plaintiffs. The Nantucket Youth Climate Committee hosted a Youth v. Gov movie screening and panel back in September 28, 2023.

According to Julia Olson, the case is about the EPA’s affirmative conduct that allows such levels of pollution, causing the planet to heat up and increase the number of wildfires and smoke pollution that harms the plaintiff’s and other youth’s health and safety. This lawsuit comes after the Held v. Montana case, where a Montana judge handed down a landmark ruling in August that was in favor of the sixteen young plaintiffs, also represented by Our Children’s Trust, which said that state agencies were violating their constitutional rights by promoting fossil fuels. Our Children’s Trust also has current active cases in Hawaii, Utah, Virginia, Montana, and Oregon. The most recent lawsuit named climate change as “the single greatest driver of the health of every child born today.” It also claims that the EPA has intentionally made the U.S. to be one of the world’s biggest contributors to the climate change crisis, and they provide reports on the harmful effects of climate change, especially to children.

The EPA spokesperson, Shayla Powell, informs that the agency cannot comment on pending legal action, but she reassures that the EPA is taking measures and actions needed at this time to combat climate change.

The EPA has also established a National Environmental Youth Advisory Council (NEYAC), described as the first federal advisory committee that is exclusively composed of young people, dedicated to the environment.

The plaintiffs of the lawsuit have lose their previous homes in wildfires and have suffered, or are currently suffering, health problems from breathing in polluted air. They’ve missed countless weeks of education because of the climate crisis-related school closures, and they had to resort to rationing tap water because of unprecedented droughts, according to the complaint.

Neal Shusterman, the author of Scythe, Dry, Unwind, Challenger Deep, and countless other books, and also a visiting author at Nantucket High School in December, has written a similar situation in Dry, where a group of teens in California attempt to survive together in a drought that drives many to do whatever they can to get even a drop of liquid, involving murder. While the book is fiction, the situation is very realistic.

The lawsuit claims that the EPA has violated the youth’s 5th Amendment right to equal protection of the law and their right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The 5th amendment is as follows with the bolded text that supports the claim: “No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.”

The lawsuit also states, “By the time they can vote, plaintiffs have experienced 18 years of climate injuries that they carry for the rest of their lives.” Olson adds that Congress has never given the EPA authority to allow life-threatening levels of pollution that it permits and has permitted for decades. Congress set up the EPA for the purpose of controlling pollution and managing air quality to promote and protect human and environmental health and safety.

You can access the Spanish translation of this article, also written by Alondra, here.

Alondra is a senior at Nantucket High School, where she serves as the secretary for the Youth Climate Committee and writes for the school's newspaper Veritas, where she is also the newspaper's Spanish translator.