Climate Lawsuits Proliferate, Confronting Corporate Polluters

July 15, 2022

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by Sara Schonhardt (Politico Pro Climatewire) Experts predict climate litigation will continue to rise over the next year, with a focus on "filling the gaps" of corporate and government policies. -- Lawsuits are increasingly targeting governments and companies for climate inaction or greenwashing, posing a rising threat to fossil fuel majors and other corporate polluters, according to a new report from the London School of Economics.

The report — from LSE's Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment — assesses trends in climate litigation since the mid-1980s and makes projections. It found that climate-related lawsuits have doubled since 2015, with a quarter of the more than 2,000 recorded cases filed in the past two years.

“People are turning to litigation as a way of filling gaps,” said Catherine Higham, a co-author of the report and coordinator of Grantham's Climate Change Laws of the World project.

Lawsuits are also starting to challenge policies for lacking ambition, equity or a focus on human rights, she added.

Higham and her co-author Joana Setzer anticipate over the next year a rise in lawsuits that challenge climate commitments that over-rely on greenhouse gas removals and that consider the responsibility individuals or corporations bear for contributing to the drivers of climate harms. They also expect more cases to focus on short-lived climate pollutants, particularly methane, since the science has become increasingly clear on the gas's contribution to warming. READ MORE

Global trends in climate change litigation: 2022 snapshot (London School of Economics and Political Science)

Excerpt from London School of Economics and Political Science: Main messages

Globally, the cumulative number of climate change-related cases has more than doubled since 2015, bringing the total number of cases to over 2,000. Around one-quarter of these were filed between 2020 and 2022.
Climate litigation has become an instrument used to enforce or enhance climate commitments made by governments, with 73 ‘framework’ cases challenging governments’ overall responses to climate change.
Over the last 12 months, further legal cases have been brought against fossil fuel companies, especially outside the United States. Cases against corporate actors are also increasingly targeting the food and agriculture, transport, plastics and finance sectors.
The number of climate litigation cases with strategic ambition (i.e. to bring about a broader societal shift) continues to rise.
Recent litigation has commonalities with some of the most important issues highlighted by the international community at COP26, including the need to increase ambition and action from countries, and phase down the use of all fossil fuels across the energy sector.
Five areas to watch in the coming year are: cases involving personal responsibility; cases challenging commitments that over-rely on greenhouse gas removals or ‘negative emissions’ technologies; cases focused on short-lived climate pollutants; cases explicitly concerned with the climate and biodiversity nexus; and strategies exploring legal recourse for the ‘loss and damage’ resulting from climate change.

Data sources

The primary source for the report is the Climate Change Laws of the World (CCLW) database, maintained by the Grantham Research Institute, which includes cases filed before courts in 43 countries and 15 international or regional courts or tribunals. This data has been supplemented by the United States Climate Litigation Database, maintained by the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law, to provide aggregated global figures. READ MORE