Climate News Update: The New Carbon Majors + Swiss Elders Win Landmark Climate Case

[00:00:00] Amy Westervelt: There have been a couple of major climate accountability stories over the past week that I want to bring you updates on. First, the carbon majors report has been updated and it found that the world's top emitters have just emitted more since the signing of the Paris climate accord in 2015.

Emissions have gotten even more concentrated in that time too, with only 57 fossil fuel and cement producers linked to 80 percent of global fossil CO2 emissions produced since the Paris Agreement was signed. The report is now part of Influence Map, which tracks lobbying efforts to delay climate policy.

And I spoke with both longtime carbon majors author Richard Heede and Influence Map program manager Dan Van Acker about this update.

That updated report is sort of the perfect setup for the other story we're going to dig into today, which is a historic ruling from the European court of human rights. The court ruled in favor of several older Swiss women who sued their government over its weak climate commitments and lack of action on climate, arguing that it was violating their right to a healthy environment. It's often referred to as the Swiss granny's case, and it's a really big deal that they won. I've got Lucy Maxwell, co director of the Climate Litigation Network with me today to talk about that.

It's all coming up after this quick break. I'm Amy Westervelt, and this is Drilled.

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[00:01:29] Amy Westervelt: For people that have read the other carbon majors report, what's should people be looking out for in this one?

[00:01:36] Daan: So, yeah, the main obviously new thing that influence map is bringing is we've updated the data fully to 2022 reporting. so the primary area of focus in our research is kind of focused on that new data. And the way we framed that is largely in assessing the period after the Paris agreement at the end of 2015.

So all the data from 2016 through 2022 and comparing the production and emissions data in those years compared to both kind of the recent period before the Paris agreement, but then also just more widely in the historical context, compared to the previous findings.

Top line what we find is some similar, but maybe even more dramatic statistics than what have been published from the data in the past. Namely, this very concentrated top line group of just 57 producers being linked to 80 percent of global fossil fuel and CO2 emissions since the Paris agreement.

[00:02:32] Amy Westervelt: I was really struck by that too. The other thing that jumped out was, just this almost even split between the investor owned and state owned entities and I wonder, I don't know if that's something that, has been analyzed before, but, I'm seeing an increased awareness of the trickiness of dealing with the state owned entities and how , different it is from the investor-owned ones.

So, yeah, I wonder if you could speak to that a little bit.

[00:03:01] Daan: Yeah, absolutely. I'm sure Rick will have thoughts here too, but I can kick off on the data side. So definitely we wanted to highlight that, just because it is interesting that obviously the data is can be used to track the differences there. So notably, uh, investor owned companies account for a slightly smaller percentage since the Paris agreement, then the nation state and state owned entities also, although obviously still being very significant in global emissions in particular, where we do highlight it in the report is that in coal production in particular, we're seeing investor owned companies, coal production is slightly on the decline while state owned and nation state producers really continue to considerably ramp up their coal production. That's really where we're seeing kind of a shift between the companies in terms of supply dynamics.

Rick, I don't know if there's anything you want to add just from a larger or a wider perspective there.

[00:03:51] Heede: Well, we don't have reserves data in the carbon majors database, but, the state owned entities own the vast majority of the proven recoverable oil and gas reserves. So it's underscores the importance of keeping state owned oil and gas and coal companies in the carbon majors database and focus for policymakers around the world, whether it be charging them reparations fees or other ways of helping entities pay for climate damages, they should definitely be in the mix.

Not only their obfuscation and, uh, and statements at COP events, but also, how they, uh, invest even more, more capital into new reserves and new production capacity. Almost every company in the Middle East, Persian Gulf, are investing billions, if not tens of billions, in expanding capacity.

[00:04:42] Amy Westervelt: I know you've been, looking at the carbon majors for a long time what's been jumping out to you in the last few years as there's been a little bit of movement on the policy front.

[00:04:57] Heede: I see more and more scientists and cloud modelers being interested in our results, uh, provided some data to people who are doing heat wave analysis and attributing responsibility for that. There are emerging programs, um, that I can't quite talk about at this point, but a lot of scientists and policymakers to some degree are interested in this data, so they can press the case against particular, both state owned as well as investor owned companies.

[00:05:27] Amy Westervelt: Apologies if this already exists and I have missed it. Is there or are there plans to be a methane majors database anytime soon?

[00:05:36] Daan: A good question. I mean, well, within carbon major. So we do track, um, the, uh, methane emissions of some of the fossil fuel production processes, at least on our side. Otherwise, it'll probably remain at that for now. I don't know, Rick, if you have plans to expand your research, research into methane.

[00:05:54] Heede: Well, we do include estimated methane emissions in our database. So we report on gigatons of CO2 equivalent through their scope one emissions, but we don't, we don't link those to company declared methane emissions because I find those not plausible.

[00:06:13] Amy Westervelt: Yeah.

[00:06:13] Heede: We have a methodology to assign or estimate and quantify methane emissions on the basis of global oil and gas and coal emissions.

On a per ton basis, I'm not saying that's absolutely accurate. I'm certain it isn't, but at least we have an estimate of attributed methane emissions that aligns more with global emissions. Then I feel like the statements made by oil and gas companies themselves tend to be underestimates, but I'm not planning a separate methane database now.

[00:06:47] Amy Westervelt: You mentioned that more scientists are interested in incorporating this data into attribution studies and things like that. Are you also seeing more, academic researchers and, lawyers and folks in the litigation space using this data as well?

[00:07:05] Heede: Yeah, I have provided data to a number of the cases now winding their way through courts in Puerto Rico, for example, in Multnomah County, and some state level attorneys general's efforts in that regard. And on the science end, I did a report with Carl Friedrich Schlusener and others on climate reparations just last fall, which I think you might have seen, but if not, I'll send you that report

[00:07:38] Amy Westervelt: Yeah, no, I thought it was so interesting.

[00:07:40] Heede: And then I did a report with Marco Grasso in Italy on estimating quantifying emissions and reparations to the leading 20 oil and gas and coal companies, which then I filed an affidavit on behalf of Greenpeace Italy and Recommon, with a court in Rome in their case against the ENI. So this interest on, and this work on a number of different levels. And then scientists come to me and said, we'd like to massage your data to see how, how we can use that to quantify, attribution to carbon measures of various heat waves.

So, they've done a global search for heat waves and tying that to to carbon major submissions, and I'm sure there'll be a lot more work coming down the road. Now, that influence map will come out with an update this week.

[00:08:37] Amy Westervelt: I find the stat about the increase in the seven years since Paris compared to the seven years before it to be both interesting and concerning.

[00:08:47] Heede: We don't have a handle on this climate change problem as you well know.

[00:08:51] Amy Westervelt: So yeah, I'm curious what you both think is behind that. I know I'm asking you to, to speculate, but, especially since influence map does look at the lobbying component as well, what do you think is driving that? Is there a sense that like, I know I'll just say anecdotally that it seems like a lot of the oil companies are kind of racing to, um, tap their resources. while the getting's good. So I wonder if, if that's…

[00:09:18] Heede: I think you're spot on. That's what's behind it. They're good at extracting carbon and selling at the best profit and they are not yet concerned enough about potential stranded assets. Based on the assumption that the world will not act quickly enough to curtail production, and so they don't see a stranded asset issue, at least not the Western companies do, which have oil and gas reserves that might range from 6 years at current production to 12 or 14 years. Horizon for the existing reserves is, is fairly short, so they feel like they can outlast, um, dragons that are coming for them.

Saudi Aramco, you know, with more than a hundred years worth of reserves, that's a different proposition. I

[00:10:04] Amy Westervelt: I do wonder if that's like, cause I noticed that, that the state owned ones have ramped up more than the investor owned. And I wonder if that's part of it, this, this desire to kind of, um, stockpile wealth from those reserves as much as possible before they lose value.

[00:10:23] Heede: think that's for far too long, and they would have to be concerned about the world getting its stuff together and curtail. Demand either by the efficient use of carbon or substitutes or alternative technologies like in transportation

[00:10:43] Daan: just to make the link back to what you said, Amy, on that point of that transition happening is obviously super dependent on effective policy. And they're exactly like influence maps research. We actually made the link in the report, highlighting some of the largest producing entities in carbon majors, we just see so many links to those companies being some of the most obstructive companies when it comes to engaging with climate policy globally.

And that's true, both for the investor and companies who are very actively engaged, but also for some of the state owned companies where we have data, they tend to be less transparent, but. Can take even more obstructive positions. So, yeah, we really do see a link there where obviously these companies are working against these policy processes that would enable or are required to enable the transition.

[00:11:30] Heede: We don't see shareholder resolutions having enough of an impact. I mean, I was hoping to get. More positive shareholder responses. So, um, at some point, large investors are going to express their concern and maybe ask the companies to funnel more of their capital resources into alternatives that can continue profiting from all of that high intensity carbon.

[00:11:57] Amy Westervelt: I was really surprised that in the top 10 companies since Paris, that only two of the investor owned companies are in that list. It's really interesting. Cause I feel like a lot of the policy comms, even litigation, you know, efforts underway target the investor owned companies and.

I'm not, I don't know. I haven't seen a lot that has figured out how to, how to deal with this state owned problem. Maybe Dan, you know, something

[00:12:28] Daan: I mean, we do assess to some extent where these companies are active in engaging with policy that isn't just their own policy area. For example, Saudi Aramco, Gazprom, they're active in other policy areas. But yeah, it's largely, as I mentioned…

[00:12:42] Amy Westervelt: black box.

[00:12:43] Daan: Yeah, they're very intransparent. Where we do have data, they're highly oppositional to any sort of ambitious climate policy. We try to, to drive awareness of that among policymakers and campaign groups. But yeah, it is definitely a difficult problem to tackle.

[00:12:58] Amy Westervelt: Can you talk through some of the methodology in terms of attributing emissions, especially, given that so many of these companies have joint ventures.

[00:13:09] Heede: We don't have access to the required data to look into every joint production agreement and joint ventures. And so we take the companies at face value for what they report as their net equity production. So, they might operate or produce oil in the Persian Gulf, but only have net equity of a certain percentage of it.

Which they report in their annual report, so we base our estimates on what they report as equity production.

[00:13:35] Amy Westervelt: Got it. That makes sense.

[00:13:38] Heede: Like it's a bit of a problem with state owned companies. But it's, you know, I think we have a pretty rigorous method for quantifying that stuff too.

But I want to mention to Amy that, um, oil and gas companies are pretty facile at communication to the public and, and trying to convince the public that they are green oil companies to fuel, and that's probably overstating it on their behalf, but that they're taking climate change Seriously, and that they're reducing their emissions and they can declare that the emissions that they are responsible for, they're reducing dramatically in line with with the Paris agreement. But, of course, as you well know, better than anybody else is that they're not looking at their Scope 3, production related emissions and only claim progress. Albeit fair enough, they're making good progress in their regard on reducing scope 2 emissions.

You see ExxonMobil, for example, having reduced their scope 1 and 2 emissions from 125 million tons about 10 years ago, to around 100 or 105 million tons now.

Still a sizable number, I mean that says. That's a pretty big number just for scope 1 and scope 2. And then you add 3, you add 450 to 500 million tons.

[00:14:54] Amy Westervelt: We have noticed this very strange increase in the, the investor owned companies like shell has done this with us now and Exxon, I think BP as well. Pushing a lot of claims that they're investing more in quote unquote low carbon solutions and then basically including gas in that.

I'm curious, if you're seeing the same thing and what you think of that.

[00:15:19] Heede: Well, I'd have been more sanguine about, natural gas if their fugitive methane rate was, was lower. It looks like Equinor, for example, producing completely offshore and using renewable electricity to run a lot of their facilities. Their natural gas is pretty clean, but most of the companies, Gazprom on down are not. So, I would like to see them put much more emphasis in reducing their fugitive and deliberately vented methane than I could buy a bit more into the notion that that's a bridge fuel to low tech technology, which has a ways to go.

I certainly agree that it's a fossil fuel, it's fossil gas. Most natural gas systems leak methane all the way from production to your home stove.

You know, investment in clean technology, by Shell and others, I think it's probably a good public gambit to phrase it that way. We certainly know that they're not investing nearly enough into really low carbon technologies. Exxon has abandoned its work on various aspects Of that, and we don't see companies being very serious.

I don't think that take the climate problem to be very serious that they're busy making money and we'll continue to do that for as long as I can.

[00:16:46] Daan: Yeah, I think we also have some data on our side to back that up. I mean, if we look in 2022, end of 2022, um, we compared a lot of the capital expenditure into green, supposed to green investment, uh, compared to fossil fuels as well as, you know, what that looks like on the marketing side.

And there's just such a big disconnect in terms of, The level at which these companies are putting out messaging around the importance of the transition and how they're contributing to it versus then actually looking at, as you say, their capital expenditure. First of all, how that compares green versus fossil fuels, but then also what they even define as green is often either not very transparent or in many cases includes unproven technologies like carbon capture, reliance on offsets or, as you say, even just including gas or certain types of of gas technologies in in that investment category. I think at the time we highlighted that perhaps the European majors were slightly better on this than the U.S. ones , but even now, you know, we've seen, like, I think it's BP and shell have both rolled back their emissions targets. So, even there, we're now kind of seeing a reversal of that.

[00:18:00] Amy Westervelt: Yeah. I'm curious about that because it seemed to me like the European majors were a little bit, more worried, let's say about being sued around, you know, reneging on Paris commitments. Does that seem like it's, it's gone away or they're just like, who cares? We're making more money. So we'll deal with the lawsuits.

[00:18:23] Daan: Yeah, I think it's tough to say. I don't know if you have higher level insights, but I think it probably comes back to what we were talking about earlier where, maybe a few years ago, it seemed like the, there was wider push for the transition also from the investor side. And now, um, that we are seeing, profits rising again in, in oil and gas, that these companies are trying to continue to eke out those profits while they still can.

[00:18:45] Amy Westervelt: One last question for both of you two is that given this data, it feels very hard for the industry to claim that they're on track or part of the transition and all that stuff. How would you like to see people use this data to push them towards actually getting on track with those commitments?

[00:19:03] Heede: I would like to see large investors and shareholders bring it up at their annual meeting, as many shareholders have been trying to do, but I think that is a leverage point. Their own investors will raise objections to their capital investment plans as not respecting the climate science. I mean, there are other ways of doing that, but shareholders have an important role to play.

[00:19:29] Daan: Yeah, I mean, I agree with that. I think also the power of the data is that it can be used in so many different ways to hold these companies to account. So also kind of the legal side that we've talked about that Rick mentioned and the academic side, but also campaign groups can use this data, as well as the financial sector.

I think that's where the power is and using this data so widely by these different stakeholders who have impact in their own different mechanisms.

[00:19:53] Heede: I'd like the product information hazard placards of gas pumps, saying this, from this gas pump causes greenhouse gas emissions. Here's, here's what it is per gallon pumped.

That's difficult, but I think we need more public warnings, like we're dealing with cigarette packs.

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[00:20:12] Amy Westervelt: Ad break

Meanwhile, in Europe, a landmark ruling from the European Court of Human Rights that's likely to have major ripple effects throughout the European Union. This is interesting in the context of the Carbon Majors report, particularly given the growing divide between investor owned and state owned oil companies on the question of energy transition.

Obviously the governments of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Qatar are not beholden to the European Court of Human Rights, but Qatar is the number one supplier of gas to Europe at the moment and has successfully locked in outrageously long contracts there. And the U. S. is right behind them battling for number one.

The European market is shifting and it's going to shift even more as governments are increasingly forced to actually comply with their climate commitments. That's going to have a big impact on suppliers in both the Middle East and the U. S. And could also really shift the math in Asia, which will be the target customer for fossil fuels that Europe doesn't want.

All that from one case in Switzerland that has been somewhat patronizingly referred to as the Swiss Grannies case. Here's Climate Litigation Center co director Lucy Maxwell with more on that case.

[00:21:33] Lucy Maxwell: Yeah, my name is Lucy Maxwell. I'm the co director of the Climate Litigation Network.

[00:21:38] Amy Westervelt: Can you just, outline briefly the cases that we were expecting rulings on today?

[00:21:44] Lucy Maxwell: Right. Well, there were three cases the European Court of Human Rights was giving its ruling today. The first was a case brought by senior women in Switzerland against the Swiss government because of its weak climate action, especially around its 2030 target. There was a case brought by Portuguese young people against 32 governments in Europe, looking at each of their actions when it comes to climate change and finding that they all fall short of best available science.

And finally, there was a case brought by a French mayor against the French government, again, because the government had failed to meet its own targets to combat climate change. And they were all alleging that those failures by their governments amount to violations of their human rights. Because of the impacts that climate change will have now and in the future on the enjoyment of health, family and private life and their mortality.

[00:22:42] Amy Westervelt: I know we're going to dig into the details, but at just a high level, can you tell me what these rulings said about each of those cases?

[00:22:50] Lucy Maxwell: So the European Court of Human Rights, upheld the Swiss senior women's climate case. And fundamentally the court found that the climate crisis is a human rights crisis, that governments have legal obligations to take much stronger action to protect people's human rights. And in this case that the Swiss government's efforts to reduce emissions were not in line with best available science.

They didn't have a clear plan of targets for the period up to 2030 and they had not even met their own targets. And so for all of those failures, the European court found that that constituted a human rights violation because the state was not protecting its people from the harm posed by climate change.

And it was looking particularly at the harm that senior women in Switzerland would experience because of the heat waves and other impacts that would happen in that country. So it found that the Swiss government had violated its human rights obligations. And now the government has to go away and create.

A robust and science based climate plan, especially before 2030. And that's what we're all focused on government action now to ensure that by 2030 we have massively slashed emissions in order to protect all of our, our futures.

In the Portuguese youth climate case, the European court found that it wasn't possible for the Portuguese young people to jointly sue 32 governments together in Europe at this European human rights court. What the court found was that because the young people are living in Portugal, it was necessary for them to take their case only against the Portuguese government and back in the national courts. The court just was not willing to accept that the nature of climate change, because everyone contributes to it, means that it's possible to sue multiple governments together.

And this was quite a new and complex argument that the Portuguese young people were making, but unfortunately the court did not accept that part of it, and they didn't go further to look at any of the other aspects of the claim, but they basically said, If you want to bring your case, you can bring it against Portugal, but you must go back to the national courts to do that.

In the French mayor's case, the European court of human rights found that he was living in France and he could sue the French government, but unfortunately he no longer lived in the place in France where he was alleging the climate impacts were happening, which was sea level rise. He now lived in Brussels, Because he's no longer the mayor of that place. He, he has work, um, outside of France and because he's not located there, he no longer has that ability to bring, bring the case. So a lot of the decisions of the court in these three cases focused on who was bringing the case. and against which kind of government. And that shows you that access to the courts can really depend on where you're living and which government you can sue.

[00:25:57] Amy Westervelt: It sounds like a lot of, uh, jurisdictional stuff being worked out too

[00:26:02] Lucy Maxwell: Yeah, absolutely. And I

[00:26:04] Amy Westervelt: like standing and all that.

[00:26:06] Lucy Maxwell: yeah. And in some ways it, it's still a very traditional approach to who can bring a court case, even though we know that, One country's emissions have huge impacts on people living far outside its borders.

[00:26:23] Amy Westervelt: right.

[00:26:23] Lucy Maxwell: But this decision, these decisions today don't open the door to those kind of global claims. It's a quite traditional approach, as far as we can tell, and it means that, yeah, it looks like the first port of call is the government. in the country that you're living. And obviously for some, for many, many affected communities, especially those, in low lying islands, um, in the global South, in a range of developing countries, the countries in which they're living are not the primary countries that have contributed to the climate crisis.

[00:27:01] Amy Westervelt: right.

[00:27:02] Lucy Maxwell: that I think is going to be a topic that many people will be discussing in the weeks to come. What does this mean for the global justice aspect of climate litigation.

[00:27:13] Amy Westervelt: Yeah, that's interesting because I was just also reading about how, Shell is being sued in the U. K., for example, for impacts in Nigeria. Because the company has a headquarters in the U. K., that can work as sort of a global case. But yeah, it's interesting that it can't be the government of another country

[00:27:36] Lucy Maxwell: Yeah, so far. That's what it seems.

[00:27:39] Amy Westervelt: So I want to dig into the I'm, I'm going to call it the Swiss granny's case. I've been indoctrinated into calling it that. I know you were just saying it's a more traditional approach.

And yeah, this is the first time, if I'm not wrong, that, that the court has affirmed that yes, this is actually a human rights violation. So, , I'm curious to hear from you what does that mean and, and why is that important?

[00:28:04] Lucy Maxwell: absolutely. The, the central finding in the Swiss case is completely groundbreaking. It's the first time that that European Human Rights Court, the highest court in Europe, has found that climate change affects human rights now and in the future, that governments have legal duties to protect human rights in the context of the climate change, in the context of the climate crisis, and that they need to adopt science based targets to prevent further dangerous climate change.

This ruling will have huge implications Not just for communities in Europe who are already taking their governments to court for weak climate action, but all around the world where there's this movement of people who are turning to the courts as a last resort because their governments are failing to act fast and effectively.

And with care and in line with science. And so this ruling will give a huge boost to that movement of climate litigation brought by communities from South Korea, to Australia, to Brazil, Canada, and all throughout Europe as well, because This ruling is influential as the European Court of Human Rights is one of the most uh, powerful human rights bodies globally in terms of its experience.

It was created in the 1950s and now it is decided that the well known human rights guarantees that have been in place for decades can apply to this very new and difficult global problem we're all tackling and that government's obligations to protect us. Apply in the same way, which is very powerful.

[00:29:46] Amy Westervelt: Quite a few of our listeners are in the U. S. and our court system works a little differently

[00:29:52] Lucy Maxwell: the decision of a court in one region is of great interest to courts in other regions. It's not directly applicable, um, by a court, say in the U S but what we, what we know is that judges are looking to each other. because they're trying to decide these very novel cases in the context of climate change.

So a judge in the U. S., especially if they're looking at a case that concerns the right to a healthy environment, like the Montana decision, or cases that are being brought by young people in Hawaii and many other states in the U. S., I'm sure they will find this decision very interesting because some of the rights that the European Court of Human Rights looked at today, like the right to life, the right to private and family life, which includes protection for health, have parallels with In different state constitutions in the US as they do in other countries around the world.

So I'm sure this will be part of a dialogue that these courts are having with each other when they're looking at how these different, um, decisions are being made and how can the well established human rights obligations of governments apply to this very new and difficult challenge of climate change.

[00:31:08] Amy Westervelt: And can I have you talk us through how does the enforcement mechanism work within the European Union and particularly Switzerland in this case?

[00:31:19] Lucy Maxwell: There's an obligation on all of the European governments that are part of this human rights treaty that they must respect a decision of the European Court of Human Rights when it's made against them. So the expectation is that Switzerland will comply with the court's ruling and will go away and significantly increase It's climate efforts put in place a proper framework from now until 2030 and ensure that that complies with what science says is necessary because that's what the European Court has ordered.

In terms of enforcement, there are a number of different paths. The European court system itself has enforcement mechanisms. So if a government is not complying, it's possible for there to be complaints and supervision and further enforcement. There's also the national court system where you can bring a case if Switzerland is not complying, say in one year or two years, and there's the need to follow up and pressure the government.

But I think most important of all is going to be the public scrutiny from everyone watching the Swiss government. There's a very vibrant civil society movement. In Switzerland, as you will have seen, the, the senior Swiss women are supported by hundreds of people, thousands of people, and they're all going to be watching because they know that it's part of the democratic rule of law system, that governments need to respect and comply with court orders.

That's also part of what will be in the background in terms of compliance and enforcement in this case.

[00:32:52] Amy Westervelt: You mentioned that this will also impact other cases that are already in motion and I imagine could also smooth the path for people that are considering these kinds of claims. Can you talk about that in a little bit more detail? What cases do you expect to most immediately be impacted by this?

[00:33:13] Lucy Maxwell: Right. There's about 40 cases pending around the world against governments brought by communities who are very concerned that their governments are not protecting them from climate change and don't have rigorous and science based climate policies. So this ruling will be of great interest to them. I'm talking here about cases in South Korea, in Australia, in Brazil, in Canada.

In Europe, where this ruling has particular binding significance, there are already cases happening against numerous high emitting governments where this decision will be particularly important. So there are already cases being brought against the governments in Belgium, Sweden, Czech Republic, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, and Poland.

And all those cases are ongoing, and they mainly focus on those governments weak 2030 targets. We know the science is very clear. Almost every government globally is not on track to reduce emissions in a way that will prevent further dangerous climate change, because their 2030 targets are too weak. And so those cases in Europe and outside will be drawing on this decision.

Because this decision very clearly says governments have legal obligations to take climate action. That climate action must be informed by science And it's really important that that action is taken before 2030 because we know this is the critical decade if we have any chance of holding warming to 1. 5 degrees and avoiding the worst future impact. So we're going to see much bolstering and boosting of the existing cases around the world. A group of about 40. And I'm sure many more who will be inspired to take climate action to the courts. But I think most of all, communities don't want to have to go to court.

They shouldn't have to put the time and the energy into litigation. No one wants that. It's a last resort. Hopefully what comes out of this decision is not necessarily new litigation. It's actual climate action by the governments. They don't, so yeah.

[00:35:23] Amy Westervelt: I wanted to ask you too, about what impact do you think it might have on the EU commission above and beyond the, the individual governments. Could it possibly influence some of the, the decision making there around energy and this green new deal stuff at the EU level.

[00:35:44] Lucy Maxwell: Yeah. Hopefully. Today's decision will have a ripple effect through all of the different government bodies. in individual countries and at the European level who determine climate policy. It's hard to speculate how the European commission might respond to this, but what they do get loud and clear from this judgment is that the failure to take strong climate action, impact people's human rights, and that science is a key source that needs to be taken into account when deciding the level of ambition of a climate target and a climate policy.

And the EU is currently determining its 2040 target right now. There will be, you know, more movement after the European elections and then there'll be a real need to decide on that target. I hope that this decision will inform that, that parliamentarians in Europe and the European Commission will be thinking very hard about the need to take ambitious action because they know that human rights are at stake, as the highest court on human rights in Europe has said today.

[00:36:51] Amy Westervelt: I'm working on a story about an industry group that represents the largest LNG producers in North America. So Canada and the U S and they are lobbying different European parliamentarians and, the energy commissioners and whatnot as well to try to get them to, embrace a, a sort of favorable policy framework for continuing to increase LNG imports to Europe, despite the fact that, all the data shows that consumption of LNG in Europe Is actually going down and that that looks like it will continue and whatnot.

So in a situation like that, where you now have this decision that's saying like, yes, in fact, failing to, to meet your own climate commitments is a violation of human rights. If that, I don't know, just could make them less. Just less open to that. I, I honestly found it a little surprising that these officials would even spend the time to meet with industry lobbyists and in various statements after these meetings they're saying things like, Oh, like we're going to need us LNG for decades. And, tabling that directive that was going to ban contracts That ended after, I think it was 2049 because they didn't want this thing that the lobbyists are pushing for, which is like 20 or 30-year contracts, um, lock Europe into LNG imports.

So, yeah, when I was hearing all of this, I was thinking maybe they'll start to think twice about that sort of thing as decisions like this come down.

[00:38:38] Lucy Maxwell: I think this ruling sends a very clear message to governments in Europe that courts will be watching their climate efforts, particularly before 2030, and that there will be scrutiny if they decide to continue their current weak and really woeful efforts to address the climate crisis.

And here I'm talking about the continued expansion of fossil fuel projects, a whole range of activities that fly in the face of science. Communities know that that's not in line with the science. And now courts are accepting that that's actually a legal matter. It's not just a question of politics.

And if governments continue to fail to act and fail to rapidly slash their emissions, um, that's something that will, that will go before the courts. And the European court of human rights has said that could amount to a human rights violation. If you have a weak target and you're not meeting your own climate target, then you could be found in violation.

So I really think that will sit on the minds of government decision makers. as they have to consider the energy transition and the wide range of policy choices they have ahead of them, they must be taking steps to slash emissions and stop the continued expansion of fossil fuels.

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