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Speaker 1: This is part four of a six part series. If

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Speaker 1: you've missed the first few episodes, go back and listen

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Speaker 1: so you'll be caught up on the story to this point.

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Speaker 1: In today's episode, we're going to look at how solid

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Speaker 1: of a case the crabbers might have and what exactly

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Speaker 1: Big Oil new and when previously on drilled.

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Speaker 2: In the end, you know, you have to stand on

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Speaker 2: principle that you believe in. That's what I was taught

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Speaker 2: and so if I separate all that from the facts

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Speaker 2: of a lawsuit and what they're trying to achieve, I

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Speaker 2: believe it's the right thing to do.

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Speaker 1: Just as West Coast crab fishermen were getting their first

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Speaker 1: real taste of what a future with climate change would

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Speaker 1: be like, media reports were revealing that some people at

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Speaker 1: least had known this was coming for a while.

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Speaker 3: Excellent scientists understood the mechanisms and consequences of human cause

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Speaker 3: climate change as early as the late nineteen seventies and

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Speaker 3: early nineteen eighties.

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Speaker 1: This is the story of two industries, one struggling to survive,

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Speaker 1: the other the most powerful and human history. The outcome

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Speaker 1: of their battle may well dictate what path we take

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Speaker 1: in dealing with climate change. I'm Amy Westervelt and this

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Speaker 1: is drilled. Season two, hot water reports from Inside Climate News,

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Speaker 1: the Los Angeles Times, and the Columbia Journalism School began

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Speaker 1: revealing internal memos from Exon scientists confirming throughout the nineteen

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Speaker 1: seventies that climate change was happening, that human emissions were

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Speaker 1: contributing to it, and that the impacts would be catastrophic

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Speaker 1: if changes weren't made. As we covered in season one, initially,

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Speaker 1: Exon employed scientists to study the problem. The thinking was

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Speaker 1: that maybe being part of the research would be a

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Speaker 1: good way to influence any regulations that might emerge. Former

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Speaker 1: Exons scientist Ed Garvey explained the company's approach to me last.

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Speaker 4: Year, I mean excellent. At the time, there was xcell

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Speaker 4: on nuclear, thre was x on coal, it was x

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Speaker 4: on solar, And at the time Exon was trying to

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Speaker 4: be an energy company, not an oil company, and so

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Speaker 4: being taken seriously at the fossil fuel discussions was to

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Speaker 4: their mind, and I think it made sense to me

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Speaker 4: at the time that yeah, this is how you would

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Speaker 4: do it if you want to be seen as not

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Speaker 4: just being an industry hacked that says we don't want

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Speaker 4: you to regulate our industry period, you need to be saying, well, yeah,

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Speaker 4: we recognize that this is a problem, and this is

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Speaker 4: how we think you should solve with these are these

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Speaker 4: are the things that are going on, and so on

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Speaker 4: and so forth, and we're making real contributions here.

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Speaker 1: But by the early nineteen eighties, the research efforts were

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Speaker 1: being shut down and the company, along with the broader industry,

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Speaker 1: was shifting toward denial. They began spending an increasing amount

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Speaker 1: of money on advertising and PR campaigns that underscored the

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Speaker 1: uncertainty of the science. At the same time, they began

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Speaker 1: investing in protecting their own pipelines and platforms from climate change.

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Speaker 1: And it's here that the Krabbers like Ben Platt really

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Speaker 1: have a problem.

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Speaker 2: You know. I think what it boils down to for

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Speaker 2: me is that I've done everything I could do as

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Speaker 2: a fossil fuel burning boat operator commercial fishermen to minimize

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Speaker 2: my carbon footprint. I spent a lot of money, let's

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Speaker 2: see six years ago now to put in one of

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Speaker 2: the newer tier engines. I got a grant for some

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Speaker 2: of it, and so I took four months off in

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Speaker 2: the middle of my crab season and repowered and spent

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Speaker 2: about sixty five thousand dollars of my own money, and

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Speaker 2: I have the least polluting, most efficient diesel engine you

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Speaker 2: can have in a fishing boat.

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Speaker 4: Right now.

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Speaker 2: It's all computer electronically controlled. I didn't even want to

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Speaker 2: do that because if you're a commercial fisherman on the

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Speaker 2: high seas, computer electronic controls scary you, because if something

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Speaker 2: goes wrong, we can't fix it. We've modernized our equipment

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Speaker 2: at a lot of our own expense and time because

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Speaker 2: we're trying to have as little of a carbon footprint

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Speaker 2: as possible. We're doing whatever we can, but there's only

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Speaker 2: so much that we can do. We're not the fossil

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Speaker 2: fuel companies. We're not the big energy companies. We're not scientists.

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Speaker 2: We can't figure out how to make a hydrogen cell

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Speaker 2: or something that'll power our boats. We're just using what's available.

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Speaker 1: Ben is someone who has accepted the climate change is

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Speaker 1: happening and that humans are a big part of the problem.

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Speaker 1: For a long time. Fellow California crabber Lori French, isn't

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Speaker 1: so sure. She's told me a few times about dinosaurs

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Speaker 1: and various periods of natural change, and particularly what was

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Speaker 1: happening when Henry the eighth was around.

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Speaker 4: We're kind of both of the opinion that climate change

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Speaker 4: has happened since the beginning gets time.

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Speaker 2: I mean, if you look at okay A.

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Speaker 1: The dinosaurs, but then during Henry, I think it's Henry

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Speaker 1: the eegist time they went through a many ice age.

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Speaker 1: Seeing what the oil industry knew and when and what

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Speaker 1: they did with that information has shifted her view a bit. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I would say there's some definite, but ultimately it kind

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Speaker 1: of doesn't matter. For LORII, it's less about climate change

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Speaker 1: and more about fairness, the idea that everyone should be

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Speaker 1: dealing with the same information, that people and markets shouldn't

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Speaker 1: be manipulated, that most people and companies are at least

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Speaker 1: trying to do the right thing. And I would like

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Speaker 1: to think that most people operate on his playing field,

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Speaker 1: but they don't.

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Speaker 4: And I don't know why.

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Speaker 1: I still keep getting surprised by that. I just do.

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Speaker 5: I like to.

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Speaker 1: Seeing the disconnect between what oil execs were saying to

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Speaker 1: each other and what they were saying to the public

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Speaker 1: shifted her worldview a lot, like it goes against my

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Speaker 1: little Pollyanna war offside.

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Speaker 6: You're doing something that you all who has harm if

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Speaker 6: you're still.

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Speaker 7: Putting it for the money.

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Speaker 8: That's not how the game is played.

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Speaker 1: Except it is how the game is played, or at

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Speaker 1: least how it has been played for a long time.

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Speaker 1: Even Crabber's like Ben, who were very on board with

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Speaker 1: the need to do something about climate change, were more

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Speaker 1: of the everyone needs to change their light bulbs and

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Speaker 1: drive less school of thought. But the more they learned

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Speaker 1: about how oil companies handle the information scientists were giving them,

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Speaker 1: the more that idea shifted.

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Speaker 2: After having studied all the background information, I've come to

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Speaker 2: the conclusions that the fossil fuel companies knew about the

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Speaker 2: warming of the climate, They knew the effect it would

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Speaker 2: have on the ocean, and they had all this information

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Speaker 2: a long time ago, and they didn't share it with

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Speaker 2: the public because it would have affected their bottom line.

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Speaker 1: This week, Drilled partnered with a fun and fascinating quick

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Speaker 1: hits science podcast called Everyday Einstein. It's hosted by astrophysicist

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Speaker 1: doctor Sabrina Steerwalt, who explains complicated scientific concepts in quick

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Speaker 1: eight to ten minute episodes that made the complex accessible.

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Speaker 1: She answers questions like how can you tell if your

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Speaker 1: tapwater is safe to drink and clears up common areas

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Speaker 1: of confusion like whether wormholes really exist. And just like

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Speaker 1: the Drilled Team, doctor Steerwell is committed to debunking misinformation

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Speaker 1: about the scientific concept shaping or world. She's done episodes

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Speaker 1: on everything from why vaccines bolster herd immunity to how

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Speaker 1: we know climate change is linked to more intense extreme

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Speaker 1: weather events. It's a great show and you're bound to

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Speaker 1: learn something new, including tips on how to explain this

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Speaker 1: stuff to other people. Find every Day Einstein on Apple Podcasts,

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Speaker 1: Potify or wherever you get your podcasts. Okay, back to

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Speaker 1: the show. The notion of personal responsibility and of demand

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Speaker 1: driving the energy market entirely is a narrative cooked up

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Speaker 1: by the fossil fuel industry the old Hey, we're just

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Speaker 1: supplying a demand defense, and it's been incredibly effective. Much

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Speaker 1: of the conversation on climate change still centers around what

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Speaker 1: individuals can do, not the systemic change is necessary to

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Speaker 1: shift the world away from carbon based economies. Seeing the

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Speaker 1: research and internal communications of oil companies and their trade groups,

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Speaker 1: the strategies laid out to confuse the science and promote

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Speaker 1: already debunked theories. Bat tends to shift the focus back

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Speaker 1: to those in power for most people, and so last

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Speaker 1: year the Pacific Coast Federation of Fisheries Associations decided to

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Speaker 1: sue the country's thirty largest fossil fuel producers, names like Exonmobile,

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Speaker 1: Chevron Shell.

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Speaker 5: I think that there are three separate things that people

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Speaker 5: really kind of sit up and take notice of.

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Speaker 1: That's vic Cher, the attorney representing the Crabbers. He's a tall,

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Speaker 1: white haired guy with a deep movie narrator voice. He's

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Speaker 1: been litigating against oil companies for decades.

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Speaker 5: First is what the industry knew when, and that starts

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Speaker 5: really with the sixties, with an acknowledgment of the problem,

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Speaker 5: internal memos, recommendations to the boards, the comments from Exxon scientists,

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Speaker 5: for example, to the board level saying we have a

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Speaker 5: narrow window of opportunity before hard choices have to be made,

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Speaker 5: and that was in the late seventies that that comment

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Speaker 5: was made. Second thing is, especially post nineteen eighty eight,

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Speaker 5: the overwhelming communications strategy, which is founded on the perpetuation

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Speaker 5: or the omulgation of doubt, so a deliberate strategy to

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Speaker 5: get people to believe that the science is uncertain to

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Speaker 5: justify action, and related and memos come out from the

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Speaker 5: American Petroleum Institute and some of the other groups where

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Speaker 5: the specific strategy is laid out of convincing the public

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Speaker 5: that there's sufficient doubt that we shouldn't act. And then

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Speaker 5: the third thing is, at the same time that there's

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Speaker 5: this public promulgation of doubt, you have internally the companies

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Speaker 5: making enormous investments in their own infrastructure and planning for

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Speaker 5: the future, so for example, raising the levels of offshore

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Speaker 5: oil platforms to account for sea level rise, strengthening them

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Speaker 5: to account for increased storm severity, and investing in the

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Speaker 5: technology to access a warming and melting Arctic.

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Speaker 1: When I asked Vic whether anything was surprising to him

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Speaker 1: about what those documents or cases have revealed, he pointed

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Speaker 1: immediately to what scientists call the Great acceleration.

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Speaker 5: We have a situation today where half of all of

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Speaker 5: the emissions from coal, oil and gas have occurred since

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Speaker 5: nineteen eighty eight or nineteen eighty nine in history, and

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Speaker 5: the annual rate of increase of the use of those

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Speaker 5: compounds has gone up by over sixty percent since nineteen ninety.

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Speaker 5: So we're talking about a recent phenomenon completely tied to

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Speaker 5: a single industry during a period of knowledge, and as

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Speaker 5: the documents that we have so far show culpability.

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Speaker 1: So as knowledge of climate change increased, so too did emissions.

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Speaker 1: And while oil companies took the necessary precautions to raise

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Speaker 1: platforms and protect pipelines, the Crabbers, like most other people

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Speaker 1: in the world, were led to believe that the science

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Speaker 1: was too uncertain to justify major investments in change. The

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Speaker 1: Krabber's legal complaint alleges that since oil companies knew their

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Speaker 1: product was harmful and didn't warn people, they're at least

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Speaker 1: partly financially liable for the consequences.

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Speaker 5: So one of the fundamental obligations that the law imposes

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Speaker 5: on a manufacture of a product is that if they

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Speaker 5: know that there's a danger associated with the use of

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Speaker 5: the product, they have to give a warning about it,

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Speaker 5: and that warning has to be proportionate to the severity

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Speaker 5: of the risk and the injury that they know accompanies it.

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Speaker 5: So we're not talking about fine print hidden away where

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Speaker 5: nobody will see it. If you know that your product

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Speaker 5: is going to destroy the world, you have to be

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Speaker 5: yelling that from the mountaintops. Frequently and constantly.

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Speaker 1: Even this is not the first time commercial fishermen have

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Speaker 1: taken on oil companies, of course, in the week of

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Speaker 1: the twenty ten Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf

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Speaker 1: of Mexico, which costs the fishing industry there are tens

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Speaker 1: of millions of dollars, a suit against BP resulted in

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Speaker 1: a multi billion dollar settlement. But this is the first

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Speaker 1: case to take on warming oceans as opposed to spills,

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Speaker 1: and it aims to hold oil companies responsible for their

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Speaker 1: role in both contributing to climate change and slowing or

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Speaker 1: even halting action on it. The crabbers hold oil companies

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Speaker 1: liable not only for the lost income from twenty fifteen,

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Speaker 1: the first year of the outbreak, but every year since.

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Speaker 1: They also want oil companies to cover the cost of

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Speaker 1: a simple solution freshwater tanks on the dock of every

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Speaker 1: crab port. Apparently, when crabs soak in fresh water for

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Speaker 1: a day or so, domoic acid is cleared. But these

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Speaker 1: tanks cost a few million dollars, and the crabbers just

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Speaker 1: don't have it, especially after a few rough seasons in

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Speaker 1: a row. Noah Oppenheim heads up the Pacific Coast Federation

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Speaker 1: of Fisheries Associations, which has taken on the suit on

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Speaker 1: behalf of its members. It's a trade association that brings

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Speaker 1: together all of the coast fisheries groups and acts as

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Speaker 1: as sort of a labor union for the West Coast fishermen.

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Speaker 1: Fishermen aren't allowed to unionize, so they're trade associations lobby

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Speaker 1: for policies beneficial to the fisheries. They also negotiate for

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Speaker 1: fair prices with buyers and sometimes organize strikes when those

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Speaker 1: negotiations don't work.

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Speaker 7: It's crystal clear that prevailing ocean conditions in twenty fifteen

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Speaker 7: and twenty sixteen and since have been driven by destabilizing

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Speaker 7: atmospheric forces, and ocean circulation dynamics have been changing because

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Speaker 7: of climate change. It's indisputable. The fossil fuel industry doesn't

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Speaker 7: dispute the science. What they dispute is whether they're culpable.

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Speaker 7: But liability law makes it clear their negligence and the nuisance,

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Speaker 7: the harm that they've caused to our members, the commercial

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Speaker 7: fishermen who've been impacted by this. They are liable and

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Speaker 7: we're holding them to account. We're going to make them pay.

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Speaker 1: A lawsuit and particularly an environmental lawsuit is not any

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Speaker 1: crabber's first choice, but for Ben, it feels like the

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Speaker 1: only tool left.

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Speaker 2: The way I look at this lawsuit is that it's

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Speaker 2: our in industry doing our part to try to do

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Speaker 2: something about climate change in this country. If you've tried

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Speaker 2: to legislate change, if you've tried to elect leaders that

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Speaker 2: would you know, for a while we had a leader

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Speaker 2: that was more interested in the environment executive director of

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Speaker 2: this country, and now we have one that's the opposite.

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Speaker 2: So if you're someone that's concerned about climate change and

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Speaker 2: the effect that it's having on your world, and in

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Speaker 2: our case, on one of our main fisheries, then what's

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Speaker 2: our last option in this country? Our last redress is courts,

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Speaker 2: So it's the appropriate thing to do. It may be

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Speaker 2: far fetched that we could win this lawsuit, but I

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Speaker 2: do think it's a worthy cause.

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Speaker 1: Down at the dock in San Francisco, Larry Collins says

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Speaker 1: he's been seeing the impacts of climate change up close

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Speaker 1: for years and it's time to do something about it.

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Speaker 8: Do I think it's pie in the sky. No, I

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Speaker 8: think we need to start doing something. We have a

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Speaker 8: long road ahead of us, and if we don't start.

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Speaker 8: We're never going to get there. I'm old. It's not

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Speaker 8: about me, but I do have grandchildren and it is

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Speaker 8: about them. And I see things, you know. I see

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Speaker 8: the tides coming up higher. I mean it's squirting through

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Speaker 8: the parking lot down at the wharf, and I never

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Speaker 8: saw that before. You get these king tides. Pretty soon

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Speaker 8: the valley's going to be underwater. I'm going to see

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Speaker 8: that in my lifetime. It's easy for the old people

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Speaker 8: to do nothing.

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Speaker 6: You know.

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Speaker 8: The young people are worried as well they should be.

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Speaker 8: And if the young people can kick the old people

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Speaker 8: in the ass and get them to do something, then

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Speaker 8: maybe we got a shot it fixing it.

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Speaker 1: But no matter how much crabbers feel like they're doing

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Speaker 1: the right thing, there's no guarantee they'll win. In fact,

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Speaker 1: they're the underdog, but they're pretty used to that. Next

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Speaker 1: time on Drilled, we'll get into why it's such a

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Speaker 1: big deal that this small industry is suing big oil

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Speaker 1: and what it means for other industries that also depend

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Speaker 1: on natural resources.

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Speaker 7: There are so many other renewable industries, industries that can

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Speaker 7: persist forever as long as we have a habitable planet

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Speaker 7: that will be damaged irrevocably if we don't fix this problem,

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Speaker 7: if we don't stop right now the rampant combustion of

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Speaker 7: fossil fuels.

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Speaker 1: We'll be back with another episode in this series next week.

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Speaker 1: But if you can't wait until then, or you just

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Speaker 1: want to support independent climate reporting, consider becoming a Drilled member.

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Speaker 1: F M F like Frank, I'm like Mary to sign up.

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Speaker 1: Thanks for your support. We really really appreciate it. Drilled

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Speaker 1: is produced and distributed by Critical Frequency. The show was

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Speaker 1: created and reported by me Amy Westervelt. Rika Murphy is

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Speaker 1: our editorial advisor, and additional editing for this series was

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Speaker 1: done by Julia Ritchie. The series was mixed by Bill Lance,

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Speaker 1: music by Elliott Peltzman. Season two cover art was drawn

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Speaker 1: by Angela Schech. Drilled is supported in part by a

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Speaker 1: generous grant from the Institute for Governance and Sustainable Development.

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Speaker 1: You can listen and subscribe to Drilled on Apple Podcasts

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Speaker 1: or wherever you get your podcasts.

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Speaker 6: If you like the show, don't forget to give us

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Speaker 6: Or you can find me on Twitter. I'm at Amy Westervelt.

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Speaker 6: Thanks for listening.

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Speaker 5: M