The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), not the courts, is the proper authority to decide issues of science and policy surrounding climate change, a federal judge in Massachusetts stated in an order issued earlier this week.

This opinion from Senior Judge Mark Wolf for the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts accompanied a ruling that granted ExxonMobil’s motion to stay a lawsuit brought by environmental group Conservation Law Foundation (CLF). CLF filed the suit in 2016, alleging that the company failed to adequately safeguard its Everett, Massachusetts oil storage facility against the impacts of climate change. The suit is now paused until the EPA has a chance to review a since-expired Clean Water Act permit for the facility or until November 2021, if a new permit has not been issued by then.

Among other things, CLF is alleging specifically that ExxonMobil has failed to consider predictable weather patterns, including weather events related to climate change, in its maintenance of the terminal.

Because CLF’s lawsuit “involve[s] responses to the alleged emerging and evolving threat of climate-change induced weather patterns,” Judge Wolf found that such implications fall within the authority of the EPA’s comprehensive regulatory scheme rather than in his courtroom:

“… how Exxon must consider predictable weather patterns-including flooding and severe storms caused by climate change-raises scientific and policy issues that the EPA is better equipped to decide than the court.” (emphasis added)

Judge Wolf also acknowledged that the renewed EPA permit – which the agency is “working in good faith to renew” by 2022 – may make CLF’s request for injunctive relief moot. Additionally, resolving the case through the courts could take at least as long as it should take for EPA to renew the permit:

“First, even if the renewed Permit does not directly address climate change, it will generate a fuller administrative record to which this court can refer to discern the meaning of particular terms in the Permit.

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“Second, the EPA’s determination on Exxon’s Permit application could render most of this case moot. As this court has previously stated, “it would be unfortunate … to have … two years of litigation and then have the EPA come out with a new permit that moots the request for injunctive relief, which is the heart of the case.

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“Third, the EPA’s renewal of the Permit may render CLF’s request for injunctive relief moot. Finally, resolving this case on the merits would take at least as long as the EPA predicts it will take to renew the Permit on terms that are now most appropriate.”

Contrary to CLF’s allegations, Judge Wolf recognizes that ExxonMobil has not only acknowledged the potential impacts of climate change on its Everett terminal, but it has worked to incorporate that risk into its engineering and operations:

“CLF argues that the EPA’s expertise is unnecessary in this case because ‘many of the facts are not in dispute.’ Opp’n Mot Stay at 22 of 27 (0kt. No. 88). For example, CLF asserts that Exxon ‘admitted that it has not considered impacts related to climate change in [maintaining] the Terminal[.]’ Id, However, this contention is incorrect. As Exxon correctly states, it ‘presumed that CLF’s allegations were true for the purposes of the motion to dismiss,’ but otherwise maintains that it engineered the Terminal ‘robustly with extreme weather considerations in mind.’” (emphasis added)

Judge Wolf’s decision is a blow to activist-driven climate litigation that tries to improperly use the courts to advance national and international climate policy. CLF is pursuing a similar climate adaptation case targeting a Shell petroleum facility in Rhode Island, which is pending in a separate court. If Judge Wolf’s ruling is any indication, a positive outcome for CLF in that case doesn’t look promising either.