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While there is scientific consensus on the causes and consequences of climate change, also reflected in international agreements and EU norms obliging states to reduce GHG emissions, domestic legislation has been slow or imperfect in implementing reduction duties. Although climate litigation is not a new phenomenon, a specific strand of climate litigation is now gaining impetus owing to the success garnered in Urgenda and the Klimabeschluss: litigation focusing on states’ omitting to lawfully regulate emission targets. This paper presents the context of novel climate litigation in the face of Russian aggression and the ensuing disincentives to promote ambitious reduction goals, proceeding to describe the arguments and findings in the two landmark cases and their effects on future climate litigation as seen in the example of the climate petition pending before the Hungarian Constitutional Court.

While there is scientific consensus on the causes and consequences of climate change, also reflected in international agreements and EU norms obliging states to reduce GHG emissions, domestic legislation has been slow or imperfect in implementing reduction duties. Although climate litigation is not a new phenomenon, a specific strand of climate litigation is now gaining impetus owing to the success garnered in Urgenda and the Klimabeschluss: litigation focusing on states' omitting to lawfully regulate emission targets. This paper presents the context of novel climate litigation in the face of Russian aggression and the ensuing disincentives to promote ambitious reduction goals, proceeding to describe the arguments and findings in the two landmark cases and their effects on future climate litigation as seen in the example of the climate petition pending before the Hungarian Constitutional Court. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Dutch courts in Urgenda ordered the government of the Netherlands to reduce national greenhouse gas emissions by 25% by 2020, compared with 1990. The case has been presented as a remarkable judicial victory of climate action advocates. With hindsight, this article questions the case's contribution to the mitigation of climate change. If the Urgenda target has been met, this had little to do with the few measures that the government took too late and too hurriedly to achieve genuine mitigation outcomes. Rather, these measures likely caused a slight increase in global long-term emissions. And while the case has raised awareness, there is no reason to assume that it has translated into momentum for climate action more than it has hindered new policy developments. This case study sheds light on practical limitations of court-imposed climate targets that may justify the greater restraint that other courts have exercised in comparable cases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses the way in which the responsibility for managing climate change risks is addressed by the Dutch courts in the Urgenda and Shell cases. A foundation called Urgenda initiated proceedings against the State of the Netherlands; followed by Milieudefensie (Friends of the Earth Netherlands) initiating proceedings against Shell, a multinational oil corporation with, at the time, its headquarters still in the Netherlands. This paper looks at both these examples of climate litigation, with a focus on what the courts had to say about responsibilities for managing climate change risks.

This paper analyses the way in which the responsibility for managing climate change risks is addressed by the Dutch courts in the Urgenda and Shell cases. A foundation called Urgenda initiated proceedings against the State of the Netherlands; followed by Milieudefensie (Friends of the Earth Netherlands) initiating proceedings against Shell, a multinational oil corporation with, at the time, its headquarters still in the Netherlands. This paper looks at both these examples of climate litigation, with a focus on what the courts had to say about responsibilities for managing climate change risks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the past decade, legal norms governing States' obligations to mitigate climate change, and courts' review of such efforts, have matured greatly in many jurisdictions around the world. In this article, we examine judicial decisions and consider future developments in Urgenda-style, or 'systemic mitigation cases' as we define them, at the national level. Systemic mitigation cases seek to compel a State or one of its organs to increase its overall mitigation efforts. These cases, which are growing in number, can lead to a significant increase in a country's overall mitigation ambition. Yet a perceived lack of standards by which to assess mitigation efforts has given rise to judicial concerns regarding the separation of powers in adjudicating such cases. In response to these concerns, we present a framework based on international climate change law and best available climate science to assist litigants and courts in human-rights- and tort-based cases. We draw on principles developed by the Dutch courts in Urgenda v the Netherlandsand on recent judgments of other national courts, and identify a range of concrete standards by which courts may assess whether a State has met the minimum legal requirements of its duty of care in the 'next generation' of systemic mitigation cases. * lucy.maxwell@urgenda.nl ** sarah.mead@urgenda.nl *** dennis.van.berkel@urgenda.nl [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]