Is action on climate change a human right? A European court rules for the first time

Everybody should be really concerned about what we're seeing globally. From our data set. Nasa's latest climate report confirms 2023 was the hottest year on record and July of 2023 was the hottest month ever recorded since the 18 hundreds. We are truly in *** climate changed impact world Ivona Sinic is *** NASA oceanographer who uses satellite imagery to study our oceans. She says data from NASA and NOAA shows that 2023 continues trend of the last 10 years being the hottest on record. This graph from NASA shows our seasonal cycle of temperature changes over time and while changes in *** couple degrees Fahrenheit might not seem like *** lot. Scientists say it is more than enough to affect our daily lives here on earth, more extreme events, more rainfall and more aggressive precipitation. But on the other side, we see droughts and heat waves and everything as impact on the local ecosystem. It changes the way that they have to behave and ultimately impacts our economy. And *** so what does that look like? Well, in some cases, it looks like this summertime beach closures thanks to high levels of bacteria or algae in the water. And last summer, we had this unprecedented red tide of the type of phyto things that had never bloomed there before. And there might have been *** response to really heavy precipitation that was hitting New England area. During the earlier in the summer, NASA and Noah are introducing *** new satellite in the next month called pace to better understand how rising global temperatures affect our water and atmosphere. Sin. It is going to be her skills to work to study our oceans, atmosphere and air quality, including places like the Gulf of Maine. This information can be useful to understand um where to put um aquaculture site, where to fish. What kind of fish fishing yield are we, you know, expecting, what kind of, what kind of water uh is it gonna be on our beaches? Can we swim? It's gonna be also able to answer day to day questions of everybody who lives um in Gulf of Maine and, and region of New England.

Europe’s highest human rights court threw out cases Tuesday brought by six Portuguese youths and a French mayor aimed at forcing countries to meet international obligations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but sided with a group of senior Swiss women who also sought such measures.Video above: NASA 2023 Global Temperature ReportThe European Court of Human Rights came down with decisions in a trio of cases brought by a French mayor, the six Portuguese youngsters and more than 2,000 members of Senior Women for Climate Protection, who say their governments are not doing enough to combat climate change.Lawyers for all three had hoped the Strasbourg court would find that national governments have a legal duty to make sure global warming is held to 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit above pre-industrial levels, in line with the goals of the Paris climate agreement. But Judge Siofra O’Leary, the president of the European Court of Human Rights, came down with mixed judgements.Judgments from the European Court of Human Rights aren’t legally binding for all 46 of the European Council’s member states, but they set a legal precedent against which future lawsuits would be judged.Although activists have had successes with lawsuits in domestic proceedings, this was the first time an international court ruled on climate change.Ahead of the ruling, a large crowd gathered in front of the court building to cheer and wave flags, including climate activist Greta Thunberg, who was coming off of multiple arrests during a demonstration in The Hague over the weekend.“We’re nervous. Nervous and excited,�� said Cláudia Agostinho, a 24-year-old who is one of the six Portuguese who brought the case to the Strasbourg court.Video below: Clarified: How to reduce your carbon footprintThe decisions have “the potential to be a watershed moment in the global fight for a livable future. A victory for any of the three cases would be one of the most significant developments on climate change since the signing of the Paris Agreement�� said Gerry Liston, a lawyer with the Global Legal Action Network, which is supporting the Portuguese students.The European Union, which doesn’t include Switzerland, currently has a target to be climate-neutral by 2050. Many governments have said that meeting a 2030 goal would be economically unattainable.The groups were confident that the 17 judges would rule in their favor, but the mixed decision could undermine a previous ruling in the Netherlands. In 2019, the Dutch Supreme Court ordered the government to cut emissions by at least 25% by the end of 2020 from benchmark 1990 levels.The Urgenda decision, referring to the climate group that brought the case, relied on the European Convention of Human Rights. It could be overturned if Tuesday’s decision concludes there is no legal obligation for countries to combat climate change.“A court ruling is binding on all countries,�� said Dennis van Berkel, who represented Urgenda in the Netherlands.Such considerations were not predominantly on the mind of 16-year-old André dos Santos Oliveira of Portugal.“The extreme heat waves, the rainfalls, followed by heat waves, it is just choking us with greenhouse effects. And what worries me is the frequency in which they started happening more and more. That’s what really scared me. And, I thought to myself, well, what can I do?�� she said.Together with five more young people, Santos Oliveira took Portugal and 32 other nations to court, arguing the failure to stop emissions violated their fundamental rights. Their case was thrown out.But judges ruled in favor of a group of Swiss retirees also demanding their government do more. Senior Women for Climate Protection, whose average age is 74, say older women’s rights are especially infringed on because they are most affected by the extreme heat that will become more frequent due to global warming.Earth shattered global annual heat records in 2023, flirted with the world’s agreed-upon warming threshold, and showed more signs of a feverish planet, Copernicus, a European climate agency, said in January.In all three cases, lawyers argued that the political and civil protections guaranteed by the European Convention on Human Rights are meaningless if the planet is uninhabitable.The countries facing the legal challenges hope the cases will be dismissed. They say the blame for climate change cannot rest with any individual country.Switzerland is not alone in being affected by global warming, said Alain Chablais, representative of the country at last year's hearings. “This problem cannot be solved by Switzerland alone.”Acknowledging the urgency of the climate crisis, the court fast-tracked all three cases, including a rare move allowing the Portuguese case to bypass domestic legal proceedings.

STRASBOURG, France —

Video above: NASA 2023 Global Temperature Report

The European Court of Human Rights came down with decisions in a trio of cases brought by a French mayor, the six Portuguese youngsters and more than 2,000 members of Senior Women for Climate Protection, who say their governments are not doing enough to combat climate change.

Lawyers for all three had hoped the Strasbourg court would find that national governments have a legal duty to make sure global warming is held to 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit above pre-industrial levels, in line with the goals of the Paris climate agreement. But Judge Siofra O’Leary, the president of the European Court of Human Rights, came down with mixed judgements.

Judgments from the European Court of Human Rights aren’t legally binding for all 46 of the European Council’s member states, but they set a legal precedent against which future lawsuits would be judged.

Although activists have had successes with lawsuits in domestic proceedings, this was the first time an international court ruled on climate change.

Ahead of the ruling, a large crowd gathered in front of the court building to cheer and wave flags, including climate activist Greta Thunberg, who was coming off of multiple arrests during a demonstration in The Hague over the weekend.

“We’re nervous. Nervous and excited,�� said Cláudia Agostinho, a 24-year-old who is one of the six Portuguese who brought the case to the Strasbourg court.

Video below: Clarified: How to reduce your carbon footprint

The decisions have “the potential to be a watershed moment in the global fight for a livable future. A victory for any of the three cases would be one of the most significant developments on climate change since the signing of the Paris Agreement�� said Gerry Liston, a lawyer with the Global Legal Action Network, which is supporting the Portuguese students.

The European Union, which doesn’t include Switzerland, currently has a target to be climate-neutral by 2050. Many governments have said that meeting a 2030 goal would be economically unattainable.

The groups were confident that the 17 judges would rule in their favor, but the mixed decision could undermine a previous ruling in the Netherlands. In 2019, the Dutch Supreme Court ordered the government to cut emissions by at least 25% by the end of 2020 from benchmark 1990 levels.

The Urgenda decision, referring to the climate group that brought the case, relied on the European Convention of Human Rights. It could be overturned if Tuesday’s decision concludes there is no legal obligation for countries to combat climate change.

“A court ruling is binding on all countries,�� said Dennis van Berkel, who represented Urgenda in the Netherlands.

Such considerations were not predominantly on the mind of 16-year-old André dos Santos Oliveira of Portugal.

“The extreme heat waves, the rainfalls, followed by heat waves, it is just choking us with greenhouse effects. And what worries me is the frequency in which they started happening more and more. That’s what really scared me. And, I thought to myself, well, what can I do?�� she said.

Together with five more young people, Santos Oliveira took Portugal and 32 other nations to court, arguing the failure to stop emissions violated their fundamental rights. Their case was thrown out.

But judges ruled in favor of a group of Swiss retirees also demanding their government do more. Senior Women for Climate Protection, whose average age is 74, say older women’s rights are especially infringed on because they are most affected by the extreme heat that will become more frequent due to global warming.

Earth shattered global annual heat records in 2023, flirted with the world’s agreed-upon warming threshold, and showed more signs of a feverish planet, Copernicus, a European climate agency, said in January.

In all three cases, lawyers argued that the political and civil protections guaranteed by the European Convention on Human Rights are meaningless if the planet is uninhabitable.

The countries facing the legal challenges hope the cases will be dismissed. They say the blame for climate change cannot rest with any individual country.

Switzerland is not alone in being affected by global warming, said Alain Chablais, representative of the country at last year's hearings. “This problem cannot be solved by Switzerland alone.��

Acknowledging the urgency of the climate crisis, the court fast-tracked all three cases, including a rare move allowing the Portuguese case to bypass domestic legal proceedings.

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Is action on climate change a human right? A European court rules for the first time

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