Environmental groups yesterday faced off against Shell at a Dutch court in a landmark bid to force the oil giant to meet emissions targets in the Paris climate deal.
The case being heard in The Hague was launched last year by the Netherlands branch of Friends of the Earth and backed by 17,300 Dutch citizens who also registered as complainants.
Six other non-governmental organizations, including the Dutch branches of Greenpeace and Action Aid, are backing the lawsuit against the Anglo-Dutch multinational, whose failure to act “endangers the future of our children,” they said.
Photo: Reuters
The 2015 Paris Agreement committed all nations to cut carbon emissions to limit warming to 2°C above preindustrial levels and encouraged them to go down to 1.5°C.
Friends of the Earth said it was impossible to meet the goals without action from the world’s “biggest polluters,” such as Shell, which it said emits twice as much carbon dioxide as the entire Netherlands.
“This is a historic moment because we are backed by so many people,” Friends of the Earth Netherlands director Donald Pols said in a statement. “This is actually ‘the People versus Shell,’ a company that has got away with greenwashing for too long.”
There are to be four days of hearings at a district court in The Hague before the case is adjourned. Campaigners do not expect a verdict until the summer next year.
Shell said that the claims in the case are “inappropriate and legally without foundation.”
The oil giant has said that it would reduce the “net carbon footprint” of the products it sells by 30 percent by 2035, and reach 65 percent by 2050.
“What will accelerate the energy transition is effective policy, investment in technology and changing customer behavior. None of which will be achieved with this court action,” a Shell spokesman said in a statement.
However, campaigners want the court to order Shell to reduce its emissions by 45 percent by 2030.
The groups would be asking the judge to oblige Shell to reduce its emissions in accordance with the targets as agreed in the Paris accord, Pols said.
“This is a unique lawsuit with potentially significant consequences for the climate and the fossil fuel industry globally,” he said.
Dozens of protesters handed the lawsuit to Shell’s headquarters in the Netherlands in The Hague in April last year in what organizers said was the first case of its kind.
Shell was one of the 100 firms responsible for 71 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions since 1988, according to a report published in 2017 by the Carbon Disclosure Project.
Climate change is a pressing issue in the Netherlands because at least one-third of the nation is below sea level.
The Dutch government last year was ordered by a court to cut greenhouse gas emissions by at least 25 percent by this year, following a legal challenge by another environmental group.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese