Florida’s Youth Take Legal Action to End State’s Fossil Fuel Dependence
January 31, 2025
Flooding in Florida after Hurrican Ian.
“There must be progress, certainly. But we must ask ourselves what kind of progress we want, and what price we want to pay for it. If, in the name of progress, we want to destroy everything beautiful in our world, and contaminate the air we breathe, and the water we drink, then we are in trouble.” – Marjory Stoneman Douglas
The majority of Delaney Reynolds’ life has centered around activism and changing the world for the better. A multi-hyphenate advocate, author, educator, lawyer, and soon-to-be Ph.D. holder, Delaney has spent years working tirelessly to raise awareness of the severe threat climate change poses to her beloved home of Miami and to push her government to act with the urgency the climate crisis demands. At 14, she founded the Sink or Swim Project. At 16, she helped write a solar energy ordinance for the city of South Miami, which ultimately passed.
On December 12, 2024, Delaney continued her quest for climate justice and, with the help of her lawyers at Our Children’s Trust, filed a complaint in Reynolds v. Florida Public Service Commission, along with five other youth against the Florida Public Service Commission. The youth plaintiffs, all lifelong Miami-Dade County residents between the ages of 18 to 25, represented by Our Children’s Trust and veteran Florida trial lawyer Mitchell Chester of the Law Office of Mitchell A. Chester, P.A., sued the Commission to hold the agency to account for perpetuating a fossil fuel-based electricity system in Florida through years of approving gas-dependent long-range energy plans produced by Florida’s electric utilities.
The case builds on years of Delaney’s and Our Children’s Trust’s legal advocacy in Florida. Reynolds v. State of Florida, filed in 2018, was the first youth-led constitutional climate case filed in Florida courts, and ultimately dismissed in 2020. A successful rule-making petition with the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services followed in 2022 and saw the publication of a statewide 100% renewable energy goal for 2050, tragically repealed by the Florida Legislature in 2024.
Undeterred, Delaney and five other youth plaintiffs filed this case to safeguard their right to a safe and livable future in Miami-Dade County. The case challenges the Commission’s decades-long rubber-stamping of fossil fuel-dependent long-term energy plans (called “10-Year Site Plans”) developed each year by Florida’s electric utilities. These 10-Year Site Plans describe existing power generating units, forecast electric power demand, provide information concerning additional power generation facilities needed to meet forecasted demand, and describe proposed sites for new generation facilities. The 10-Year Site Plan process is the only long-term energy planning process overseen by any Florida agency.
The complaint details how, since at least 1999, the Commission has approved every single utility 10-Year Site Plan and explains how the Commission’s conduct has guided Florida’s electricity system into its current dependence on gas as a fuel source.
Nearly three-quarters of Florida’s electricity generation comes from gas – far above the national average of 45.3%. The Commission’s conduct also prevents the adoption of renewable sources of electricity, despite the Florida Legislature enacting a law in 2006 explicitly calling for the promotion of renewable energy and the lessening of “Florida’s dependence on natural gas and fuel oil for the production of electricity.” Due to the size and gas-dependence of Florida’s electricity sector, it emits nationally and globally significant levels of greenhouse gas emissions – each year, Florida’s electricity sector alone emits more climate pollution than many countries’ entire economies, including Colombia, a country with nearly 30 million more people than Florida.
The Plaintiffs assert that by affirmatively worsening the already dangerous climate conditions plaintiffs face in Miami-Dade County that impair their lives and prospects for a livable future, the Commission is violating their fundamental right to enjoy and defend life guaranteed by Article I, Section 2 and fundamental right to life guaranteed by Article I, Section 9 of the Florida Constitution.
As lifelong Miami-Dade County residents, the Plaintiffs are all acutely aware that the region they love and call home is “ground zero” for climate impacts in Florida and the United States. The case, filed in the Eleventh Judicial Circuit Court for Miami-Dade County, focuses on the young Plaintiffs’ injuries they are experiencing growing up in Miami-Dade County, noting the County’s particular vulnerability to sea level rise, extreme heat, tropical storms, and coral bleaching. The complaint describes how each Plaintiff’s lives have been disrupted by climate change and their government’s policies that prioritize the use of fossil fuels.
Peter, youth plaintiff in Reynolds v. Florida Public Service Commission.
For example, ocean warming and acidification are bleaching Miami-Dade’s coral reefs and altering the marine ecosystems, degrading Plaintiff Delaney and Peter’s recreational enjoyment of Miami-Dade’s special marine ecosystems when diving and snorkeling. Sea level rise threatens the Plaintiffs’ homes and critical infrastructure and drinking water aquifers they rely on. Plaintiff Peter’s family home on Key Biscayne, which has an average elevation of only five feet above sea level, is particularly vulnerable to sea level rise. Extreme spring and summertime heat and heatwaves have caused several Plaintiffs to experience heat exhaustion, headaches, and nausea, and have forced Plaintiff Jasmine to stay indoors and forego planned outdoor activities in her neighborhood which suffers from the urban heat island effect. Extreme tropical storms such as 2017’s Hurricane Irma have disrupted several of the Plaintiffs’ studies, hindered their mobility, and damaged their homes.
The complaint also details how each Plaintiff experiences fear and anxiety over the future they’re inheriting and whether they’ll be able be able to safely live in Miami-Dade County as climate disruptions intensify. Plaintiff Vanessa fears having children of her own due to the world that she would bring new life into.
Earth just recorded the two hottest years since the beginning of instrumental measurements consecutively (2024 and 2023). The past ten years have been the hottest ten years on record. Miami-Dade County is warming the fastest of any county in Florida. Miami-Dade County has the highest population of any Florida county, an average elevation of only 10 feet above sea level, and has experienced the most sea level rise in Florida since 1970. Faced with these facts, one would think the Commission would use its authority to steer Florida away from its gas dependence and begin harnessing the tremendous solar energy potential of the “Sunshine State.” However, the Commission continues to sign off on utilities’ gas dependence – approving utilities’ 2024 10-Year Site Plans which forecast at least 54% of electricity to come from gas-fired generation in 2033.
This is why Delaney, and her co-Plaintiffs have chosen to stand up and protect their constitutional rights. The stories and experiences of the Plaintiffs directly connect the climate injuries they are experiencing with their ability to live safe, fruitful, and healthy lives now and into the future. A favorable ruling in this case would establish a key victory in the struggle of Florida’s youth for climate justice, establish landmark precedent in Florida’s right to life jurisprudence, and compel the Commission to begin steering Florida’s electricity system away from fossil fuels.