Civil liability for greenhouse emissions

Document Type : Original Article

Author

Faculty of Law - Zagazig University

Abstract

Millions of people are already suffering the catastrophic effects of extreme weather disasters exacerbated by climate change – from prolonged droughts in sub-Saharan Africa to devastating tropical cyclones sweeping across Southeast Asia, the Caribbean and the Pacific. Extreme temperatures have caused deadly heat waves in Europe and wildfires in South Korea, Algeria and Croatia. There have been severe floods in Pakistan, while a severe and prolonged drought in Madagascar has left a million people with very limited access to adequate food. The devastation that climate change is causing, and will continue to cause, is a grave alarm for humanity. But there is still time. The world's leading scientific body for assessing climate change - the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) - warns that global greenhouse gas emissions must "peak before 2025 at the latest, and be reduced by 43 percent by 2030 if we are to Limit the global temperature rise to 1.5°C and avoid a real catastrophe. Massive action must be taken immediately, but this urgency must not justify the violation of human rights.

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