Congress: Fix America's Climate Laws

Climate disasters are getting more expensive, and ordinary people are being handed the bill. Families lose homes. Insurance rates climb. Communities rebuild. Taxpayers pay for disaster response and recovery.

Meanwhile, fossil fuel companies continue to profit, communities keep absorbing the costs, and some of the most basic questions about federal climate policy are still being fought out in court.

William S. Becker, a former regional director at the U.S. Department of Energy, argues in a new Washington Post commentary that Congress can end this cycle by writing clearer climate rules into federal law. His argument comes as the Supreme Court considers a major case over whether states and communities can pursue climate-damages claims against fossil fuel companies.

He is right. Congress should act on four fronts.

Regulation: Explicitly identify greenhouse gases for regulation and give the Environmental Protection Agency unmistakable authority to regulate them.

Liability: Establish clear rules for when fossil fuel producers can be held responsible for climate damages and how responsibility should be divided between producers and consumers.

Compensation: Create a federal climate damages fund for states and communities, financed by fossil fuel companies based on their contribution to the pollution driving climate change.

Future generations: Require the federal government to consider the long-term climate consequences of its decisions and its obligations to the people who will inherit them.

Together, these steps would strengthen EPA’s ability to cut climate pollution, create clearer rules for accountability, help communities pay for climate damages, and make long-term consequences part of federal decision-making.

Congress has created similar systems before. Federal law has made responsible industries help finance hazardous-waste cleanup, oil-spill response, and benefits for coal miners suffering from black lung disease.

Climate change already has a price tag. The question is whether families and taxpayers will keep carrying so much of it while Congress leaves the biggest questions unresolved.

Sign the petition to tell Congress to stop leaving America's climate future to courtroom battles and political ambiguity. Pass clear federal laws that protect communities, hold polluters accountable, and safeguard future generations.

The petition to Congress reads: Strengthen America's climate laws. Clearly authorize EPA regulation of greenhouse gases, establish fair climate liability rules, create a fossil-fuel-funded climate damages fund for communities, and require federal decisions to account for their consequences for future generations.
_______

Source:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/ripple/2026/10/05/congress-must-fix-climate-laws/