The News
The Hague Court of Appeal handed a major victory to Shell on Tuesday, reversing an earlier judgment ordering the oil giant to reduce its carbon emissions by 45% by 2030 in a case filed by Friends of the Earth Netherlands.
The company had argued that such an order would simply drive emissions to other firms without actually lowering overall global emissions.
In a statement, the director of Friends of the Earth Netherlands described the ruling as a “setback,” but ultimately one that would “only help [the climate movement] grow stronger.”
A spokesperson from the nonprofit group told Semafor that they had not had enough time to analyze the judgment to decide whether to lodge an appeal with the Dutch Supreme Court, but hoped to know “by the end of the week.”
SIGNALS
Technological ‘fixes’ by oil and gas giants risk licensing yet more fossil fuel production
Sources: Semafor, The Guardian, Disconnect
ExxonMobil’s CEO told Semafor’s Tim McDonnell that rather than focus on cutting fossil fuels, the world should instead develop the capability to use oil and gas without emitting greenhouse gasses — an argument that activists and researchers say is flawed because such technologies have not yet proven effective. The UK government’s plan to spend at least £21.7 billion ($27.7 billion) on carbon capture and storage will actually increase emissions, George Monbiot argued in The Guardian. Oil and gas companies have lobbied so hard for such policies because they license continued fossil fuel production, he wrote. “A magical tech solution is constantly on the horizon,” a tech critic argued for the Disconnect blog, but all this does is provide an excuse to avoid necessary structural change.
Attention turns to the International Court of Justice
Sources: Center for International Environmental Law, International Institute for Sustainable Development
The ruling grants Shell temporary reprieve, but momentum for climate accountability is “growing” as attention will soon shift to the International Court of Justice, which is set to hold public hearings from December on states’ duties to regulate corporations within their jurisdictions, a legal expert at the Center for International Environmental Law wrote in a statement. These proceedings, which began as a student-led initiative in Vanuatu, already represent a “watershed moment” in the fight for climate justice, and any advisory opinion issued by the ICJ could “provide a foundation for future litigation at both domestic and international levels,” another expert argued for the International Institute for Sustainable Development.
No high hopes for COP29
Sources: Barron’s, Wired, Nature
The decision comes just as COP29 opened in Azerbaijan, where the global climate summit’s host extolled fossil fuels as a “gift from God.″ The victory of climate skeptic Donald Trump at last week’s US presidential election has already cast a shadow over proceedings, and key figures are absent, including the EU chief and the embattled German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Wired noted. Under President Joe Biden, the US was already failing to meet its commitment to climate finance — the main theme of COP29 — and “few see any prospects” of Trump’s incoming administration stepping up, Nature reported.
