Court actions seeking to impose a reduction obligation or compensation on a state or a company, now a measurable liability exposure.
Climate litigation gathers actions of very different natures that it is misleading to treat together. Claims against states seek recognition of a reinforced duty grounded in fundamental rights, and they have prospered, with several supreme courts holding that an insufficient climate policy breached protected rights. Actions against companies pursue either a reduction obligation of their own, or compensation based on historic contribution to emissions, or the sanctioning of misleading commercial claims, the last being the most effective because it rests on consumer law that is already well tested. For insurance the exposure sits first in directors and officers cover, since the claim targets management decisions rather than bodily injury or property damage, and for that reason escapes the pollution exclusions of conventional liability policies. The pricing difficulty lies in the absence of a loss in the usual sense, the cost consisting of defense expenditure and obligations to act whose monetary value is undetermined.
The Hague District Court ordered Royal Dutch Shell on 26 May 2021 to cut its net emissions by forty-five per cent by 2030 against a 2019 baseline, a ruling overturned on appeal on 12 November 2024 as to the quantum while confirming that a reduction obligation exists. The European Court of Human Rights held on 9 April 2024, in Verein KlimaSeniorinnen Schweiz, that the inadequacy of Swiss climate action breached Article 8 of the Convention.
climate litigation, procès climatique, action en justice climatique