https://pacheco-torgal.blogspot.com/2020/11/can-salvation-of-planet-be-achieved.html
Still following the post in the link above about a previous article published in 2020 in The Economist its refreshing to read once again about that same subject in a recent article titled “Lawsuits aimed at greenhouse-gas emissions are a growing trend”
According to the article climate litigation has become such a liability that “Several big fossil-fuel companies…have been systematically including climate lawsuits as a potential material risk”. Moreover, following a case presented by a Dutch environmental organization a Dutch court has ordered Shell to reduce its emission by 45% in 2030. Its truth Shell has appealed but the fact is that “Pending a new decision, though, it must comply“.
The article becomes much more “juicy” when it describes the case of a Peruvian farmer whose property “is at risk of being damaged by a dwindling glacier in the mountains above it“. The farmer´s lawyers filed a case against RWE (Europe largest carbon emitter) in a German court, using a report of the Climate Accountability Institute that concluded 0.47% of all emissions were caused by RWE so this company should be forced to pay 0.47% of the costs required to protect the farmer property. The case was initially dismissed but afterward, a German appeals court deemed it admissible!
PS – The last number of the TIME is also dedicated to climate but it has the wrong approach when it claims that “The fight against climate change is now in corporate hands“. It’s not in corporate hands but instead in corporate pockets through climate litigation!
Pacheco-Torgal 