We were in the room at the Carrboro Town Council meeting tonight, which had a short open session to swear in new Council Member Cristóbal Palmer – it was lovely! – and then immediately went into a mysterious closed session. (Our live feed from Bluesky is here.)
When council returned in open session 22 minutes later, we learned that the town was filing a civil action against the Duke Energy Corporation.
Tomorrow, the town will hold a news conference at Town Hall at 2pm to share details. A press release issued by the Center for Biological Diversity lists three media contacts: the Town of Carrboro, NC WARN, and the Center for Biological Diversity. We don’t yet know which of the three parties have filed the lawsuit.
What we do know is this: In 2022, the Town of Carrboro joined with the Center for Biological Diversity and the Sierra Club to file a notice of intent to sue the Environmental Protection Agency to force it to act on a petition challenging the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s air-pollution permit. Chapelboro has a good rundown. The EPA later denied that petition.
Tomorrow’s press conference also concerns climate.
The press release notes: “Like communities across the U.S., Carrboro has been battered by climate change, which has caused significant harm to the town and its infrastructure. Experts expect the trend of more extreme weather, including higher temperatures and stronger storms, will increase in the region over the coming years. The Carrboro Town Council’s job is to prevent and mitigate hazards to public health, safety, welfare and the environment. Carrboro has been working for years to fight climate change and reduce its reliance on fossil fuels, including setting emissions-reductions targets and installing energy efficient technologies, while extreme weather events like Hurricane Helene have pummeled the region.”
Update 12/4
The Guardian has picked up the story
The litigation, filed by officials from Carrboro, North Carolina, on Wednesday morning, accuses Duke Energy of waging a “deception campaign” to obscure the climate dangers of fossil fuels. Those efforts resulted in delayed action to curb planet-heating pollution, which has pushed up the costs of climate action today, the lawsuit says.
There is now a website for the lawsuit: https://www.suedukeenergy.org/
The Town of Carrboro has a website up about the lawsuit. Documents are here:
NPR has also picked up the story.
The town has sent out a press release. You can read it in full here.
The New York Times sent out a push alert! Their story is here.
Chapelboro put out a really great historic and in-depth look.
Here is the town press conference:
The Daily Tar Heel published a story.
Update 12/5
We received a question yesterday asking how much the Town of Carrboro and taxpayers would be paying for the civil action against Duke Energy. We asked. The answer is $0. Their legal costs and expenses are being covered by NC WARN.