On November 24, 2014, the Court of Appeal for the Fourth District granted a request to publish the recent case Sierra Club v. County of San Diego, 2014 Cal. App. LEXIS 1077. In the decision, the appellate court affirmed the trial court and granted a writ of mandate requiring a supplemental environmental impact report (EIR) for San Diego County’s Climate Action Plan (CAP).

The publication of the opinion comes on the heels another key California environmental law case in Cleveland National Forest Foundation v. San Diego Association of Governments, 2014 Cal. App. LEXIS 1070. In both cases, the Fourth Appellate District examined the application of Governor Schwarzenegger’s 2005 Executive Order No. S-3-05 and the Legislature’s subsequent climate change mandates in AB 32 and SB 375. The executive order required statewide reduction of greenhouse gas emissions to 2000 levels by 2010, to 1990 levels by 2020, and to 80 percent below 1990 by 2050.

In the newly-published Sierra Club opinion, the court emphasized the specific evidentiary support required by lead agencies in complying with the mandates of the 2005 executive order and subsequent legislation. The executive order “requires consistent emissions reductions each year from 2010 through 2020 and then a greater quantity of emissions reductions each year from 2020 through 2050.” Lead agencies such as the County cannot rely on compliance with other state and federal statutes and planned but unfunded programs to meet the greenhouse gas emission reduction requirements. A “good faith, reasoned analysis” under CEQA requires more than citations to entire appendices in the County’s CAP; it requires specific evidence that people will participate in the various programs to the extent necessary to achieve the emissions reductions.

A complete summary of the case is available here: https://thomaslaw455.wpengine.com/appellate-court-requires-supplemental-eir-san-diego-countys-climate-action-plan/.