An appeals court in the Netherlands overturned a sweeping climate ruling on Tuesday requiring Shell, Europe’s largest energy company, to reduce carbon emissions by 45% by 2030, reported The New York Times.
The NYT wrote that the original ruling, issued in 2021 by a district court in The Hague, was seen as groundbreaking and likely to encourage similar challenges globally. It had attracted widespread attention because Shell was at the time one of the largest and most important companies based in the Netherlands. A few months later, Shell moved its headquarters to London.
Milieudefensie, the Dutch arm of the environmental group Friends of the Earth that brought the original case, had argued that Shell had a duty to accelerate emissions reductions to protect people in the Netherlands and globally, according to the NYT.
Shell appealed the initial verdict, saying that putting the onus on a single company to reduce emissions would not reduce demand for oil products and therefore would not be effective.
On Tuesday, the Court of Appeal in The Hague largely rejected Milieudefensie’s arguments, saying that Shell did have “an obligation toward citizens to reduce CO2 emissions,” an important legal point, but that the responsibility lay more with government.
“It is primarily up to the government to ensure the protection of human rights,” the court said in a news release.
“We are pleased with the court’s decision, which we believe is the right one for the global energy transition, the Netherlands and our company,” Chief Executive at Shell Wael Sawan said.
Tuesday's ruling coincides with the COP29 U.N. climate summit in Baku, Azerbaijan, where opening procedures were delayed on Monday by a dispute over how prominent the future of fossil fuels should be on the agenda, reported Reuters.
The court noted that Shell was already working on a plan to reduce the emissions resulting from its production of oil and natural gas. Reuters reported that Shell plans to invest $10-15 billion between 2023 and 2025 in low-carbon energy.