15 October 2026
Beyond Boulder
The making of climate law is a distinctly global exercise. Perhaps more than in many other areas of law, climate litigation develops through a conversation across jurisdictions, as litigants borrow arguments, evidence, and strategies from proceedings elsewhere, while judges engage with decisions from vastly different legal traditions. And so, when one of the world’s biggest players in the legal landscape speaks, the rest have particular reason to listen. Continue reading >>
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11 October 2026
Carbon Majors in Brazilian Courts
On October 9, 2026, Brazil’s Federal Prosecutor’s Office and a nonprofit environmental association, Instituto Preservar, sued Shell Brasil Petróleo Ltda. for damages caused by the April and May 2024 floods in my home state of Rio Grande do Sul. The filing now places Brazil among the jurisdictions where public enforcers sue fossil fuel producers, which the litigation over the 2024 floods had not previously included. It also offers a concrete setting for the interplay between the causal nexus of Brazilian environmental liability and the attribution of a climate disaster to an emitter. Continue reading >>
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03 September 2026
The Constitution Meets the Climate
The climate crisis has reached South Africa’s Constitutional Court. A dispute over offshore oil and gas exploration along South Africa’s Wild Coast developed into a much wider constitutional inquiry. The Court brought questions of participation, dignity, culture and environmental protection into conversation with the growing demands of climate responsibility. The judgment illustrates how climate change can acquire constitutional significance without the recognition of a freestanding constitutional right to a stable climate. Continue reading >>
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26 June 2026
Mapping the Future
On 25 June 2026, the Paris Judicial Court became the first court to rule on the merits of Notre Affaire à Tous and others v. TotalEnergies SE. At its core, the case concerns whether TotalEnergies violated the French Commercial Code by failing to adequately report the climate risks associated with its activities and take action to mitigate those risks in line with the goals of the Paris Agreement. The decision demonstrates that a domestic due diligence statute can reach the full climate footprint of a global energy major. Continue reading >>
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04 May 2026
The Fuel Price Blockades in Ireland
April 2026 has been the most politically charged month in Ireland in recent memory. Irish roads, ports and refineries across the country were blocked with tractors and heavy agricultural and haulage vehicles over the course of the week starting April 7. Essential services were compromised, and several parts of the country came to a halt. Contrary to media commentary, the blockade enabled a union of fossil capital and racial capital. Continue reading >>23 April 2026
A Jus Cogens Right to Climate Action
Phasing out fossil fuels is indispensable to meaningful climate action. Yet, significant legal barriers persist. Among the most formidable is the system of international investment law, particularly the mechanism of investor–state dispute settlement. One way to counter this type of legally entrenched climate obstruction is for States to clarify that their right to climate action is a new peremptory norm of international law, as per Article 64 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties. Continue reading >>
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28 January 2026
The State Duty Not to Approve New Fossil Fuels
A growing number of cases worldwide are challenging State approval of new fossil fuel projects: from Ireland to Guyana, Greece to South Africa. UN Secretary General, António Guterres, describes such projects as “moral and economic madness”. But since 2021, over 2,300 new extraction projects and 119 new LNG Terminals have been approved for development worldwide. States’ approval of new fossil fuel projects is fundamentally incompatible with their international law duties. Continue reading >>07 October 2025
Is Meat the New Oil?
For decades, the global community has grappled with the increasingly urgent need for an equitable transition away from fossil fuels – achieving some, but inadequate, progress. Today, there is growing recognition that meat and other animal products, particularly from the industrial systems that enable high levels of meat consumption, also have far-reaching environmental, public health, and social impacts. This industry will need to transform on a similar time frame in order to achieve climate and broader sustainable development goals. Continue reading >>
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07 October 2025
Exxon Knew. Did Big Beef, too?
Just like the fossil fuel industry, the meat industry teamed up with trade associations, public relations, and “merchants of doubt” to distribute disinformation, downplay their role in global warming, and influence climate policy. Our research showed that all of the 10 largest U.S. meat and dairy companies had directly contributed to efforts that minimized the link between animal agriculture and climate change. For eight of the 10 companies, we found evidence of lobbying on climate issues between 2000 and 2019.Just like the fossil fuel industry, the meat industry teamed up with trade associations, public relations, and “merchants of doubt” to distribute disinformation, downplay their role in global warming, and influence climate policy. Continue reading >>
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28 August 2025