Short Course: Climate Change Litigation

Course Details

Climate Change Litigation is an increasingly critical component of climate governance at the local, national, regional and global levels, exerting pressure on the executive and legislative branches of government to act on the climate change issues. At the same time, climate change-related cases have also been filed against private actors, mostly fossil fuel and cement companies, which are major greenhouse gas emitters. Young people, NGOs and others have taken to the courts to challenge governments' and corporations' actions or inactions.

This course is based around the most compelling practical issues and relevant sectors, while combining the scientific and legal frameworks and obstacles through which climate change litigation takes place. Finally, climate change litigation will be analysed as a global phenomenon, taking stock of landmark examples at the international and domestic levels, wherever they appear.

By the end of the course, participants will:

• Be cognizant of the role of climate litigation in pursuing climate action
• Have a clear understanding of the principal issues, dynamics and obstacles of climate change litigation, both from a domestic (comparative) and international perspective;
• Be better able to critically understand and assess the legal tools and principles related to climate change litigation;
• Be able to identify critical domestic, comparative and international climate-related cases and opportunities for climate action.
  
  

Course topics:

• Global Perspectives and Scientific Foundations on Climate Change Litigation
  Dr Ivano Alogna, Senior Fellow in Environmental and Climate Change Law
  Dr Carly Phillips  Senior Research Scientist, Science Hub for Climate Litigation, Union of Concerned Scientists
• Justiciability in Climate Change Litigation
  Prof Christina Eckes  Professor of European Law, University of Amsterdam, and Director, Amsterdam Centre for European Law and Governance
  Nigel Pleming KC, Barrister, 39 Essex Chambers; Honorary Senior Fellow, BIICL

• Jurisdiction and Choice of Law in Climate Change Litigation
  Prof. Geert Van Calster, Full Professor, KU Leuven; Fellow, Melbourne Law School; practising member of the Belgian Bar and Dr. Ekaterina Aristova, Senior Lecturer in Private Law, University of Surrey
  
• Evidentiary and Attribution Science-related Issues in Climate Change Litigation 
  Michael Burger, Executive Director of the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law, Columbia University and Jessica Wentz, Senior Fellow at Sabin Center for Climate Change Law, Columbia University
  
• Remedies and the Impact of Climate Change Litigation
  Dr Joana Setzer, Associate Professorial Research Fellow, Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, London School of Economics and Political Science and Dr Noah Walker-Crawford, Research Fellow, Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, London School of Economics and Political Science
• Climate Change Litigation and Human Rights
  Crisela Bernardino, Research Leader in Climate Change Litigation and International Law, BIICL and Ingrid Gubbay, European Head of Human Rights and Environmental Law, Hausfeld, and Visiting Research Fellow, BIICL
  
• Corporate Climate Liability
  Prof. Elbert de Jong, Professor of Private Law, Utrecht University, and Director, Utrecht Centre for Accountability and Liability Law and Dr. Irene Pietropaoli, Senior Fellow in Business and Human Rights, and Director, Business and Human Rights Forum, BIICL
• Climate-washing Litigation
  Catherine Higham, Senior Policy Fellow, Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, LSE and Frank Peters, Head of Impact & Litigation and co-founder, Rubicon Impact & Litigation
  
• Climate Change and Insurance Litigation
  Jason Reeves, Managing Partner, London Office, Zelle LLP and Deepa Sutherland, Counsel, Zelle LLP
• Climate-related Trade and Investment Dispute Resolution
  Prof. Markus W. Gehring, Professor of European and International Law & Director of Studies in Law at Hughes Hall, University of Cambridge, Wendy Miles, KC Barrister, Twenty Essex
  

 Download the course programme 

Pricing and Registration

The course fee is £825 per person.

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Discounts

20% discount available for:

• individual and organisational members of BIICL
• groups of 3 or more attendees from NGO organisations or staff of government
• groups of 5 or more attendees from commercial organisations

For group bookings, please contact us.

Course leader

Dr Ivano Alogna, Senior Research Fellow in Environmental and Climate Change Law, British Institute of International and Comparative Law.

Who is the course for?

This course would benefit practitioners in private law firms and NGOs; civil servants, provincial departments and local authorities; environmental managers in private sector; civil society organizations; activists, academics and students.

Course format

The virtual course format will consist of a series of 10 sessions in which live (synchronous) teaching is offered via Zoom. Participants will be able to interact with the tutors and amongst themselves on screen.

Testimonials from past attendees

"This is a really excellent course. Really informative and well structured. It is suitable for anyone interested in this area including non-lawyers."
"I really appreciated the course and learned a lot during this training. The sessions were engaging and well-structured, making complex topics easy to understand... I highly recommend this course to anyone interested in deepening their understanding of climate law"

Further opportunities

Through its partnership with BIICL, the University of Lausanne (UNIL) allows you to use this BIICL Short Course towards the LLM and CAS Programmes in International Business Law at the University. If this is of interest, please contact Prof Eva Lein or Shaheeza Lalani to discuss further. Please note that additional requirements (delivery of a written assignment following the course) will apply.

Ready to book?

Deepen your understanding of climate change litigation and join a global network of professionals.

REGISTER HERE