NY Climate Change Superfund Act signed into law

ALBANY, N.Y. (NEWS10) -- Governor Kathy Hochul signed the Climate Change Superfund Act into law, holding big oil companies responsible for polluting the environment. The companies will be required to pay $75 billion over 25 years to offset infrastructure damage that led to climate change.

Blair Horner, executive director of New York Public Interest Group, says before the state receives money from them, a regulatory process has to be ironed out to figure out how much each oil company has to pay.

"It’s those who contributed more than one billion tons of greenhouse gases or more. And they pay on a sliding scale—so who’s in, who’s out, how much they pay still has to be figured out through a regulatory process run by the Department of Environmental Conservation," said Horner.

New York is now the second state in the nation to require fossil fuel companies to pay for infrastructure damage. Earlier this year, Vermont passed similar legislation.