Three environmental groups have told London’s High Court that Britain’s new climate action plan is unlawful because ministers received incorrect information about meeting emissions targets.
Friends of the Earth, ClientEarth, and the Good Law Project are challenging the government’s carbon budgets to achieve Britain’s net zero target by 2050.
The case reflects concerns about Britain’s diminished role in global climate leadership and increasing legal pressures on governments and corporations worldwide to address climate change.
In a similar case in 2022, the High Court ruled that Britain had violated legislation meant to support the 2015 Paris Agreement’s goal of limiting temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.
The British government had to change the plans approved last year. However, environmental groups argue that the new plan is also illegal because then-energy minister Grant Shapps was not informed of the risk that emission reduction policies might not be achievable.
According to Friends of the Earth’s lawyer David Wolfe, Britain’s Climate Change Committee cautioned last year that less than 20% of the needed reductions to meet the carbon budget for 2033-2037 had credible policies in place.
Wolfe added in court filings that Shapps “proceeded on the assumption that the reductions in emissions of greenhouse gases from all of the proposals and policies … would all be delivered in full when there was no evidential basis.”
