Calif. sees sprawl as warming culprit

USA Today reports:

California is pioneering what could be the next battleground against global warming: filing suit to hold cities and counties accountable for greenhouse gas emissions caused by poorly planned suburban sprawl.

The unprecedented action is being closely watched by states that have taken aggressive steps to combat climate change — including New York, Massachusetts and Washington.

California Attorney General Jerry Brown has sued San Bernardino County, the USA's largest in land area and one of the fastest growing, for failing to account for greenhouse gases when updating its 25-year blueprint for growth.



"It's ground-breaking. California is just leading the way for other states and jurisdictions that will ultimately follow," says Richard Frank of the Center for Environmental Law and Policy at the University of California-Berkeley.


In Massachusetts, Gov. Deval Patrick in April ordered regulators to require developers of projects large enough to undergo state environmental review to assess how they contribute to global warming.

In New York, global warming is one of Attorney General Andrew Cuomo's "top priorities," says spokesman Jeffrey Lerner. "He's very focused on it. He feels like we need to do everything we can to address that issue right away."

The California lawsuit, filed in the spring, argues that the 1970 California Environmental Quality Act requires greenhouse gases to be regulated like any other type of pollution. Sixteen states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and Guam have similar laws, but no other state has used these laws to sue over global warming.

If the suit is successful, California cities and counties could be forced to take steps to limit sprawl, promote compact development, require builders to design energy-efficient houses that offer solar power, and encourage less driving, more mass transit and use of alternative fuels.

Since most Americans don't want to take public transportation we assume that California doesn't want an increase in population.Texas and Tennessee would be happy to have more electoral votes.