A federal judge tossed out a global warming related case on Monday brought against U.S. automakers by California’s attorney general. The case was the first suit seeking compensatory damages from companies that cause global warming through green house gas emissions. The attorney general argued that the six automakers on trial, General Motors Corp, Ford Motor Co, Toyota Motor Corp, the U.S. arm of Germany’s DaimlerChrysler AG and the North American units of Japan’s Honda Motor Co and Nissan Motor Co Ltd., were responsible for over 30 percent of carbon dioxide emissions in California.

Martin Jenkins, the federal judge overseeing the case, said that the issue of global warming should be resolved through political means, not judicial. As he put it:

“The Court is left to make an initial decision as to what is unreasonable in the context of carbon dioxide emissions. Such an exercise would require the Court to create a quotient or standard in order to quantify any potential damages that flow from Defendants’ alleged act of contributing 30 percent of California’s carbon dioxide emissions. The balancing of those competing interests is the type of initial policy determination to be made by the political branches, and not this Court.”

Ken Alex, California’s supervising deputy attorney general, said his office is considering an appeal since, as he stated, “judges frequently decided reasonable standards in cases such as dumping of pollution into rivers.”

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Commentary: This was simply a pre-season game and none of the parties are going to be exhilarated with the outcome, including the car companies. Just like lawsuits that McDonald’s faced over obesity, the fight to assign legal liability for “public” damages that may occur from global warming will continue.