Last week the Sabin Center published a report that looks back on climate litigation developments in 2025. This third installment in our year-end series provides a snapshot of how the field of climate litigation has evolved over the course of
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New Article on Climate Science and Natural Resource Litigation
Climate change has major implications for the sustainable use and conservation of natural resources. Rapid and unprecedented changes in bioclimatic conditions can significantly affect the integrity, productivity, and carrying capacity of ecological systems
Greenwashing on Trial: The Paris Tribunal Finds TotalEnergies Misled Consumers with Its Carbon Neutrality Claims
Introduction
On October 23, 2025, the Judicial Tribunal of Paris (Tribunal judiciaire de Paris) found in Greenpeace France and Others v. TotalEnergies SE and TotalEnergies Electricité et Gaz France that TotalEnergies and its French subsidiary engaged in misleading environmental advertising.
The Energy Justice Resistance: How States Can Counteract Federal Attacks on Community Benefits Plans
The Biden Administration tied historic federal clean energy funding in the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act Law (IIJA) and the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) to a local benefits framework through the Department of Energy’s Community Benefits Plan
Decommissioning Offshore Oil and Gas: A Conversation with Former Regulators
A 2024 report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found that over 2,500 wells and 500 platforms in the Gulf of Mexico were overdue for decommissioning (i.e., the process whereby wells are permanently plugged and associated infrastructure removed). Others have
Climate Skeptics Rush to Misuse Texas v. BlackRock
Texas v. BlackRock (E.D. Tex.) (BlackRock), a case in which 11 states claim that the institutional-investor defendants colluded to profit through coordinated output reductions at coal companies they partially owned, remains in its early stages, with discovery continuing through 2027.
New Book Explores the Need for Climate-Compatible Infrastructure Development and the Legal Issues it Raises
The 30th Conference of the Parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) reached a disappointing conclusion on Saturday. Just a few days earlier, things had looked promising. The COP President—Ambassador André Corrêa do Lago of
Junior Scholars Call for Papers
Columbia Law School’s 14th Annual Sabin Colloquium on Innovative Environmental Law Scholarship will allow junior environmental law scholars to present early-stage work and receive constructive feedback from a panel of senior scholars and from each other. It will be held on
Looking Back at U.S. Climate Litigation During the Biden Years—and Some Thoughts on Emerging Trends During the Second Trump Administration
Today the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law published a report analyzing climate change lawsuits filed in United States courts while President Joseph R. Biden was in office. During the Biden administration, the federal government reversed course on the first
To Implement or Not to Implement: New York State’s Climate Law in 2025
It is a basic principle of administrative law that, even after a jurisdiction enacts legislation, full implementation of the law typically depends on regulatory and other actions by executive branch agencies. This is particularly true in the context of environmental