Pennsylvania county joins other local governments in suing oil industry over climate change | KLRT [Video]

A large suburban Philadelphia county has joined dozens of other local governments around the country in suing the oil industry, asserting that major oil producers systematically deceived the public about their role in accelerating global warming.

Bucks County’s lawsuit against a half dozen oil companies blames the oil industry for more frequent and intense storms — including one last summer that killed seven people there — flooding, saltwater intrusion, extreme heat “and other devastating climate change impacts” from the burning of fossil fuels. The county wants oil producers to pay to mitigate the damage caused by climate change.

“These companies have known since at least the 1950s that their ways of doing business were having calamitous effects on our planet, and rather than change what they were doing or raise the alarm, they lied to all of us,” Bucks County Commissioner Gene DiGirolamo said in a statement. “The taxpayers should …