A judge has ruled in favor of youths who claimed Montana‘s use of fossil fuels contributed to the climate crisis and harmed their health.

The ‘monumental decision’ was based on the state’s policy in evaluating requests for fossil fuel permits – which does not allow agencies to assess the effects of greenhouse gas emissions – was found unconstitutional.

The youths, aged five to 22, did not seek a payout following a win but wanted defendants to ‘bring the state energy system into constitutional compliance.’

Experts said the plaintiffs had Montana’s constitution on their side, which likely helped with the ruling.

Article Nine reads: ‘The state and each person shall maintain and improve a clean and healthful environment in Montana for present and future generations.’

The trial convened in June, and plaintiffs spent five days sharing stories about injuries they claimed came from climate change and how their homes have been negatively impacted.

District Court Judge Kathy Seeley wrote in the ruling that ‘Montana’s emissions and climate change have been proven to be a substantial factor in causing climate impacts to Montana’s environment and harm and injury’ to the youth.

Now the ruling is in the hands of the state Legislature, which has to determine how to bring the policy into compliance.

That leaves slim chances for immediate change in a fossil fuel-friendly state where Republicans dominate the statehouse.

Montana has the nation’s largest recoverable coal reserves – over 74 billion tons – nearly one-third of the US total, according to MBMG Coal Program.

The state also ranks sixth in coal production, with about 30 million tons produced annually from 6 mines.

In 2022, coal generated 42 percent of Montana’s in-state electricity generation, but the resource supplied more than half until 2016.

This is compared with hydropower at 41 percent and wind power at 12 percent, according to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA).

Part of the hearing heard the plaintiff’s attorneys state Montana has never denied a permit for a fossil fuel project, The Washington Post reports.

Judge Seeley heard from a 15-year-old plaintiff who has asthma.

He told the court how he felt like ‘a prisoner in my own home’ when isolated with COVID during intense wildfire smoke, which he said resulted from climate change.

Rikki Held, the 22-year-old plaintiff, has been vocal about her family-owned cattle ranch, which she claims was also destroyed by the climate crisis.

Held said her family ranch relied on the nearby Powder River to grow crops and hydrate cattle.

The river dried up in 2007, and then in the spring of 2017, ‘abnormally high temperatures linked to the climate crisis caused the frozen river to melt at a rapid rate and flood,’ the lawsuit claimed.

The state argued that even if Montana completely stopped producing carbon dioxide, it would not affect a global scale because states and countries worldwide contribute to the amount of C02 in the atmosphere.

‘I know that climate change is a global issue, but Montana has to take responsibility for our part in that,’ Held said during the hearing.

The lawsuit, filed in March 2020, described how children are more vulnerable to the impacts of the climate crisis, noting it ‘harms their physical and psychological health and safety, interferes with family and cultural foundations and integrity, and causes economic deprivations.’