As billion-dollar climate disasters mount in the DMV, policy experts and lawmakers map out practical tools to move climate disaster costs off taxpayers and onto major fossil fuel polluters

WASHINGTON, DC — As regional climate disasters pile tens of billions of dollars in damages on communities every year, elected officials and experts convened today for a high-profile webinar to make the case for a simple shift in who pays those costs: from everyday families to Big Oil. The event, hosted by the Chesapeake Climate Action Network (CCAN) Action Fund, featured U.S. Senator Chris Van Hollen (MD), Maryland State Senator Katie Hester (D9), Virginia Delegate Rae Cousins (HD79), and leading climate accountability experts, who discussed legal and legislative pathways to ensure fossil fuel companies pay their fair share for climate destruction rather than leaving taxpayers stuck with those skyrocketing bills.

Speakers drew parallels to past accountability efforts, noting that industries such as Big Tobacco and Big Pharma have been held accountable for public health damages associated with their products. At the national level, Senator Van Hollen’s Polluters Pay Climate Fund proposal would require the largest fossil fuel corporations to pay based on their historic emissions, generating hundreds of billions of dollars over the next decade to rebuild infrastructure, support disaster recovery, and invest in frontline communities that are hit first and worst by climate disasters.

“We’re all gathered here because we believe in a simple but powerful principle, which is that polluters should pay to clean up the mess that they have made, and those who contributed the most to the mess should pay the most to help clean it up,” said Senator Van Hollen. “The cumulative costs of climate change are huge, so it’s very important that we do not turn to taxpayers to pick up the bill. We should turn to those who are most responsible. That’s why I introduced the Polluter Pays Climate Fund Act at the national level.” 

Speakers also highlighted emerging state-level solutions showing how this “Make Polluters Pay” approach is already taking shape across the region. In Maryland, speakers highlighted the RENEW Act framework, which begins with a comprehensive state study to tally the true price tag of climate-fueled floods, storms, and heat, then uses that data to design a “climate superfund” fee on the world’s biggest fossil fuel companies, with revenue dedicated to resilience, public health, and environmental justice. 

State Senator Hester’s spokesperson said, “In Senator Hester’s district, Ellicott City experienced two so-called 1000-year floods in 2 years. Howard County has now spent more than $200 million on flood mitigation, including a massive 18-foot tunnel under Main Street. Annapolis is spending $88 million to protect City Dock. Our public schools face more than $700 million in air conditioning upgrades because extreme heat is making classrooms unsafe. These are real numbers showing up in today’s budgets, and they contribute directly to Maryland’s projected structural deficit, which we are talking about all the time in the State House. Meanwhile, the companies that knew for decades that they were contributing to the crisis have paid zero. So, moving forward, a full RENEW Act framework could shift these hundreds of millions in climate costs off of families and local governments and onto the fossil fuel companies that caused the harm.”

In Virginia, participants discussed new legislation that would classify major fossil fuel corporations as “responsible parties” for at least a billion tons of historic emissions and require them to reimburse the Commonwealth for climate-related damages, rather than leaving taxpayers to bear the burden. Speakers outlined a clear roadmap for making polluters, not families, pay for the rising costs of climate chaos.

“We also saw this last year with Hurricane Helene, which inflicted billions of dollars of damage on families and small businesses, and communities in southwest Virginia, and we know that those communities still do not have the resources, even over a year later, that they need to fully recover,” said Delegate Rae Cousins. “And it is families and small businesses that are left to pick up the pieces while our local governments here in Virginia struggle to fund recovery, and I just, you know, I don’t think it’s fair that we keep asking Virginians to rebuild each disaster without changing the way that we fund relief and resilience. And right now, we know that the largest corporate emitters, the companies whose pollution significantly worsens climate-driven damage, those companies are paying none of the costs of the destruction that their emissions helped to create, and this legislation begins to address that.”

Today’s webinar highlighted growing bipartisan and grassroots support for state and national efforts to shift recovery costs onto those most responsible for the climate crisis. Legal experts from the Conservation Law Foundation explained the precedent for state-level polluter accountability laws, while advocates from Fossil Free Media discussed the national movement building to support “Make Polluters Pay” legislation across the United States. 

“For far too long, fossil fuel giants have reaped record profits while our communities have shouldered the costs of their pollution,” said Victoria Higgins, Virginia Director at Chesapeake Climate Action Network (CCAN) Action Fund. “It’s time to restore fairness and to make Big Oil cover the tab for the climate damages they’ve caused and give taxpayers the relief they deserve.”

A full recording of the event is available HERE. 

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Chesapeake Climate Action Network (CCAN) Action Fund is dedicated to driving change in public policies at the local, state, and national levels to address the climate crisis. Through voter education, lobbying, and participation in the electoral process, we seek to advance our country’s leadership in the global movement toward clean energy solutions — focusing our efforts primarily in Maryland, Virginia, and Washington, DC. We know that a vibrant democracy is central to our success so we work to defend democratic integrity wherever we can.