Climate Law Blog

By Amy Turner and Michael Burger Cities around the U.S. have long demonstrated leadership on climate change, with more than 170 of them having set targets to phase out fossil energy and many others committing to net zero greenhouse gas emissions. American cities, towns, counties, and other forms of local government have pioneered path-setting approaches to […]

Achieving the Paris Agreement’s goal of limiting warming to “well below” 2oC above pre-industrial levels will require an immediate and dramatic reduction in greenhouse gas emissions which must reach “net zero” around mid-century. This will likely necessitate the use of so-called “negative emissions technologies” that can remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere to offset emissions […]

By Daniel J. Metzger Countries around the world are increasingly setting national emissions reductions targets and articulating policy objectives to address climate change impacts. As they do, a broad set of actors are turning to courts to seek enforcement of existing climate laws, to articulate clearer definitions of climate rights, to ask for compensation for […]

By Romany Webb Despite scientists’ dire warnings about the catastrophic impacts of climate change, the greenhouse gases that cause it continue to be emitted in substantial amounts. There is no question that deep, across the board cuts in greenhouse gas emissions are essential, but many scientists now agree that simply cutting future emissions will not […]

Since January 2017, the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia University has been tracking the Trump administration’s ongoing efforts to rewrite federal climate change policy and deconstruct climate governance. Today, the Sabin Center released a collaboratively authored report that outlines a series of executive actions that a Biden administration could take to do […]

By Lauren Kurtz This week the Climate Science Legal Defense Fund (CSLDF) officially launched a series of guides to scientific integrity at nine federal agencies. The guides are intended to help researchers understand their employers’ policies and navigate the process of filing a scientific integrity complaint. They also reveal which agencies have strong policies and […]

By Michael Burger, Jessica Wentz, and Radley Horton The evolving field of climate change attribution science plays a critical role in shaping our understanding of how humans are affecting the global climate system, and in informing discussions about responsibility for climate change impacts. Attribution science, which explores the links between climate change and extreme weather […]

By Madeleine Siegel and Alexander Loznak Climate change is already generating enormous costs to the environment and public health both in the United States and around the world. These costs will only escalate over time with increasing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.  Under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), U.S. federal agencies must assess the environmental […]

By Dena Adler A newly released Sabin Center White Paper, “State Hazard Mitigation Plans & Climate Change: Rating the States 2019 Update,” reviews how well the states have integrated climate change into their State Hazard Mitigation Plans (SHMPs). SHMPs serve as “blueprints” for state efforts to prepare for natural and man-made hazards and must include […]

The Trump administration has undertaken a sweeping portfolio of actions aimed at weakening federal climate protections and promoting the development and use of fossil fuels. A new report from Columbia Law School’s Sabin Center for Climate Change Law takes a critical look at what this effort has actually accomplished. It concludes that the administration has […]