They're already happening, based on argued failure to disclose the risks of global warming to investors, and they serve the twin purposes of 1) ramping up pressure on utilities, energy companies and other targets; 2) extracting monetary class action settlements. New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has lent a hand to the environmentalist/plaintiffs' side (Carol Zacharias, John Liner Review (Advisen)(PDF) via Mason Power and Kevin LaCroix (scroll))