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Judge rules in favor of Montana youths in landmark climate decision

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Judge rules in favor of Montana youths in landmark climate decision

#4
I didn't realize how explicit the Montana state constitution was on this [1], which was rewritten in 1972:

Part IX. ENVIRONMENT AND NATURAL RESOURCES

Section 1. Protection and improvement. (1) The state and each person shall maintain and improve a clean and healthful environment in Montana for present and future generations.

(2) The legislature shall provide for the administration and enforcement of this duty.

(3) The legislature shall provide adequate remedies for the protection of the environmental life support system from degradation and provide adequate remedies to prevent unreasonable depletion and degradation of natural resources.

[1] https://leg.mt.gov/bills/mca/title_0000/article_0090/part_00...

Re: Judge rules in favor of Montana youths in landmark climate decision

#6

This is the kind of thing that is inspiring to young people. Not watching a couple of billionaires experience weightlessness for a few minutes.

Why does it need to be either/or? Some youths might be inspired by watching non-astronauts in space, some may be inspired by this climate activism. Others may be inspired by watching re-runs of Futurama. The important thing is the inspiration, not what triggers it.

Re: Judge rules in favor of Montana youths in landmark climate decision

#7
AFAICT without being an expert:

1. The state constitution says it's got to provide a clean environment

https://leg.mt.gov/bills/mca/Constitution/IX/1.htm (so short I won't provide a quote)

2. The Montana Environmental Policy Act in Montana has some exceptions written into it and in subsequent revisions

https://leg.mt.gov/content/Publications/Environmental/2021-m...

3. One of these exceptions is that it limits the scope of environmental review for some energy projects (Cmd-F "energy" in above link)

4. I didn't read the case docs so I don't know which particular limit or if something else was it violated the constitutional thing but something did according to the court.

I don't know what the things are that the folks are fighting against, but if it is one of those "everything must be environmentally reviewed" things that's used to stop windmills and nuclear plants from being built, then I'm on the other side of the kids. The article is that it's over fossil fuels, which sounds like the right target, but if someone else has details then please do share.

Re: Judge rules in favor of Montana youths in landmark climate decision

#8

This is the kind of thing that is inspiring to young people. Not watching a couple of billionaires experience weightlessness for a few minutes.

Why does it need to be either/or? Some youths might be inspired by watching non-astronauts in space, some may be inspired by this climate activism. Others may be inspired by watching re-runs of Futurama. The important thing is the inspiration, not what triggers it.

The important thing is what it inspires.

Re: Judge rules in favor of Montana youths in landmark climate decision

#9

This is the kind of thing that is inspiring to young people. Not watching a couple of billionaires experience weightlessness for a few minutes.

Why does it need to be either/or? Some youths might be inspired by watching non-astronauts in space, some may be inspired by this climate activism. Others may be inspired by watching re-runs of Futurama. The important thing is the inspiration, not what triggers it.

And some are inspired by that NPC trend on tiktok. There's definitely a difference in kind between sources of inspiration.
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