The lawsuit attacked the groups for running a newspaper advertisement in "The New York Times" on December 13,1999, entitled "Global Warming - How Will It End?" The advertisement highlighted the causes, potential impacts and possible solutions to global warming and mentioned "coal" as a cause.

The suit was filed last year by Western Fuels Association, an arm of the power industry that purchases hundreds of millions of dollars of coal each year. The suit named as defendants the Turning Point Project, the International Center for Technology Assessment, Friends of the Earth, Ozone Action, Earth Island Institute and the Rainforest Action Network.

The lawsuit attempted to establish a new legal precedent by invoking the federal Lanham Act, which applies to commercial speech among competitors, in a case involving political speech.

The environmental groups learned today that the federal district court in Wyoming issued an order dismissing the suit. The opinion by Chief Judge William Downes holds that the lawsuit was improperly brought in Wyoming and that Western Fuels' had failed to show why the environmental groups, based in Washington, DC and San Francisco, should be sued in Wyoming.

Western Fuels had contended that any statement in the media connecting "coal" with global warming should be construed as an attack on the Wyoming coal industry. The court rejected this argument, holding that it "does not agree with Plaintiff’s characterization that the subject of this action is coal" and instead held the case to be one about speech.

"The environmental and human health threats of global warming are real and serious," said Dr. Brent Blackwelder, president of Friends of the Earth. "We are pleased that the court would not entertain a suit brought by polluters who want to limit the ability of citizen groups to warn the public about these risks."