by Alex Baumhardt, Oregon Capital Chronicle
November 4, 2026
An Oregon judge will allow the climate lawsuit Multnomah County’ filed more than three years ago against some of the world’s largest fossil fuel companies to move forward.
Multnomah County Circuit Court Judge Adele J. Ridenour issued her decision Monday denying 20 of 21 arguments the fossil fuel defendants made to dismiss the 2023 case. Ridenour’s decision allows the case to continue to move toward a trial.
Multnomah County filed the $51 billion lawsuit against Chevron, Exxon, ConocoPhillips, Shell and the American Petroleum Institute, among several other companies and industry groups, following the 2021 heat dome when temperatures for five days in a row reached more than 100 degrees and R69 people in the county died. The Capital Chronicle reached out Wednesday to lawyers for those companies and the petroleum institute, as well as lawyers for seven other defendants but did not hear back.
The county has argued that the fossil fuel companies disproportionately caused the heat event to occur because for decades they knowingly deceived the public about the safety of their products. They allege the companies collectively spent billions to market their products as safe while burying and undermining science that showed that the burning of their products would drive catastrophic levels of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, changing the climate, warming the earth and causing extreme weather events such as drought, heatwaves and wildfires. The county has asked for the billions in damages due to negligence, fraud and deceit, among other charges.
The decision to allow the case to move forward comes months after Ridenour in June heard two days of oral testimony from the fossil fuel defendants, who argued centrally that Multnomah County is trying to effectively impose penalties on global and interstate pollution, which, under the federal Clean Air Act, is a power that the U.S. government, not state governments, hold.
But Ridenour said that while the county does find the companies’ fossil fuel pollution is at fault for the 2021 heat dome, the county is not seeking damages for the pollution itself, but for the companies’ deceptions to Oregonians, which allowed the pollution to continue to occur for decades.
“It’s deception. That’s — again to use the court’s language — that’s the gravamen of this case,” said Roger Worthington, a Bend-based lawyer helping Multnomah County on the case. “Did the defendants engage in deceptive practices designed to sell more oil, and in so doing, try to convince the public that climate change was a hoax? That they had no involvement? And then, did they engage in greenwashing efforts to convince the public that they’re actually working on the problem when they’re really not?”
The fossil fuel defendants also argued that the case can’t be heard in the state courts because it deals with accusations related to business that was done outside of Multnomah County and Oregon. But, the judge ruled the state does have the power to hear the case, and the county to bring it, because it deals specifically with accusations that the companies lied to Oregonians. Ridenour allowed one company, Valero, to be dismissed from the case because the county did not establish that Valero engaged in enough business or messaging in the state over the years.
Worthington said he hopes the case makes it to trial in his lifetime, but one more attempt by the fossil fuel companies could also stall or stymie it.
The fossil fuel companies are challenging the county in a separate argument for dismissal under Oregon’s anti-SLAPP law, which prohibits lawsuits that are brought solely to silence critics.
A judge heard arguments in that plea last week, and it’s unclear when they’ll issue a decision, Worthington said.
“It was disturbing to hear some of the most powerful companies in the world argue that the county was trying to punish them for engaging in political speech,” Worthington said. “There’s political speech, and then there’s commercial speech. There’s speech by companies designed to market their product and, in our theory, deceive the consumers about the dangers of burning their product in terms of climate change. And moreover, fraud is not protected speech.”
Multnomah County is one of 40 local and state governments that have sued fossil fuel giants over their role in climate change. A Supreme Court ruling in a similar case brought against oil companies Exxon and Suncor by Boulder County, will likely impact Multnomah County’s case.
Boulder has argued for eight years that fossil fuel companies are responsible for climate change deception that has led to high-cost disasters in the state. But the case has yet to go to trial as those fossil fuel companies have repeatedly tried to have it dismissed or moved to federal court.
Oregon Capital Chronicle is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Oregon Capital Chronicle maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Julia Shumway for questions: [email protected].