Maine bill would make oil companies pay into ‘climate superfund’

Democratic lawmakers in Maine are looking to create a climate superfund that would collected fees from groups that extract fossil fuels and refine crude oil to fund clean energy initiatives.

Only two states — Vermont and New York — have passed similar laws, but those are being challenged in court by businesses and the Trump administration.

Maine is among 11 states currently considering bills to create similar climate superfunds.

LD 1870, a bipartisan bill sponsored by Rep. Stacy Brenner, D-Scarborough, would would be retroactive and apply to any fossil fuel extractor or crude oil refiner between Jan. 1, 1995 to Dec. 31, 2024.

Brenner said the proposal is a matter of fairness, because greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels is causing increased storm damage and public health concerns and the costs are being borne by state and local taxpayers.

Earlier this session, Gov. Janet Mills signed a bipartisan, emergency bill that allocated $39 million for recovery and rebuilding of communities and businesses damaged in a strong of winter storms in late 2023 and early 2024.

“I believe Mainers understand fairness,” Brenner said. “When a company causes harm, it should help pay to fix it.”

The bill, which is co-sponsored by Sen. Rick Bennett, R-Oxford, would “assess a cost recovery demand for the entity’s share of fossil fuel extraction or refinement contributing to greenhouse gas-related costs in the state,” provided that the entity is responsible for more than a billion metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions.

The funds would be used for clean energy and climate initiatives, including 35% for climate projects benefitting low-income people with “environmental justice concerns.”

The other bill, LD 1808, sponsored by Rep. Grayson Lookner, D-Portland, would establish a similar fund, only it would only be retroactive to Jan. 1, 2000 and would not contain a minimum allocation for low-income people with environmental justice concerns.

Both bills were heard Monday by the Environment and Natural Resources Committee, which did not take action.

Vermont became the first state to establish a climate superfund last year, followed by New York, whose law seeks to recover $75 billion over the next 25 years from fossil fuels companies. Vermont’s law has no cap.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the American Petroleum Institute filed a lawsuit challenging New York’s law. The U.S Department of Justice filed its own lawsuits last week against Vermont and New York.

In April, Trump signed an executive order, “Protecting American Energy from State Overreach,” directly targeting state efforts to assess fees or fines on out-of-state energy producers to fund climate initiatives.

The order directs the attorney general to stop the enforcement of any state law the burdens energy producers, especially laws “purporting to address ‘climate change’ or involving ‘environmental, social, and governance’ initiatives, ‘environmental justice,’ carbon or ‘greenhouse gas’ emissions, and funds to collect carbon penalties or carbon taxes.”

Melanie Loyzim, commissioner of the Maine Department of Environmental Protection, said superfunds are “intriguing” and of interest for the administration. But she urged lawmakers to hit the brakes until next year, saying Maine would benefit from seeing how implementation — and the legal challenges — play out in Vermont and New York.

“Adopting some version of a climate superfund in Maine now creates an administrative burden for the department to develop a program that may be struck down by judges in the coming year,” Loyzim said. “The last couple weeks of insane committee work is not the right time to pass into law something of this significance.”