Is France facing the Climate 'Case of the Century’?
Welcome BACK to Climate Weekly!
This year, we hope we’ll be able to fill your indoor Fridays with inspiration from around, and some of the most interesting emails you’ll see from new young climate reporters each week.
This week, meet Julie Bourdin, a French and South African multimedia journalist, whose work has focussed on human rights, activism and migration.
Bonjour, et bonne année !
I am Julie Bourdin, happy to be writing this first newsletter of 2021 from Paris, where we recently welcomed our first light snowfall of the winter.
It was nothing, though, compared to the historical snowstorm that paralyzed Madrid over the past few weeks. A friend of mine wore a helmet inside their house in fear that their roof would collapse under 40cm of snow!
As often happens during cold weather events, some people took the storm Filomena as proof against global warming. The president of the region of Aragón tweeted: “it does not seem that climate change will necessarily mean the disappearance of snow”.
I find it puzzling that these arguments could come out every time we see snow. 2020 was the hottest year ever recorded in Europe, 1.6°C higher than the 30 year average. In the past 120 years in France, seven out of the ten hottest years happened in the last decade. Since my childhood, I cannot remember a summer that wasn’t plagued by heatwaves.
But climate change of course doesn’t only imply global warming,it pushes the whole climate system out of sync. Meteorologist Isabel Zubiaurre phrased it well on La Sexta when she said: “the Earth has a fever, with record cold and record heat”.
Madrid under the snow (Credits: Sangarsuarez)
However, there is a small sign of hope, thanks to legal challenges pushing the French government towards a better answer to the climate crisis.
On January 14, several NGOs brought the French State to court for its “climate inaction”. The “Case of the Century” mobilized 2.3 million people in a petition launched 2 years ago.
The NGOs, including Greenpeace and Oxfam, are now seeking symbolic damages of 1€ for the government’s failure to tackle the climate crisis and keep in line with its commitments of the 2015 Paris agreement.
The court’s decision is to be published in two weeks. A victory could have historical implications, recognizing the legal obligation of the State to fight climate change. In a statement, Oxfam France explained that “all the victims of climate change could then use this jurisprudence to assert their rights and claim compensation”.
As a journalist focusing mainly on migration and refugee rights, another legal development in France caught my eye: an appeals court in Bordeaux overturned the deportation of a man from Bangladesh, arguing that his severe asthma would put him at a high risk because of extreme air pollution in his home country.
Several newspapers described this as the first legal recognition of a “climate refugee”, with the court clearly taking the environmental risk as a factor in its decision, a first in this sort of hearing. The 40 year-old man, whose father himself had died of an asthma attack, will be allowed to remain in France and continue the treatment he started here.
I am excited to see how the outcomes of these landmark court cases could push France towards a more proactive and inclusive reaction to the climate crisis - and maybe, like the Urgenda Climate case against the Dutch government in 2015, it could inspire similar lawsuits across Europe.
While I know this year’s biggest story will be about the COVID vaccine, 2021 could also be the year of groundbreaking climate change litigation across Europe.
Thought of the Week
My thought this week isn’t about Biden or Trump, its about the US environmental movement.
In his first act as President, Joe Biden signed executive orders to rejoin the Paris Agreement, block the Keystone XL pipeline, and asked all federal agencies to review how their work aligns with science.
He’ll add to this next Wednesday with his plan to re-establish the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.
Almost the exact opposite of Trump’s first week in office.
After Trump was signed in though, we saw a wave of increased funding for environmental causes like never before. It was called the Trump Bump, and seemed to last up until 2019.
We also saw inspired new movements like Fridays for Future and the Sunrise Movement take centre stage.
As Biden takes over, many of these organisations and supporters will believe that they now have an ally; but an ally they can “push” and “hold accountable” with a real opportunity to challenge.
However many of their supporters and funders might also believe that the inspiration for their giving spree back in 2017 has gone, and their allegiance may shift to causes like poverty relief and racial justice.
Where does this put the US environmental movement?
It will certainly need to reinvent itself under Biden, both strategically but also as a means of inspiring new funding streams that may soon change course.
Good luck
This is a weekly newsletter created by Climate Tracker.If you have any questions, comments or want to get involved, email me at chris@climatetracker.org.