• About
    • Which Energy Mix is this?
  • Climate News Network Archive
  • Contact
The climate news that makes a difference.
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
No Result
View All Result
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
  FEATURED
Renewables ‘Set to Soar’ with 440 GW of New Installations in 2023: IEA June 4, 2023
Greek Industrial Giant Announces 1.4-GW Alberta Solar Farm, Canada’s Biggest June 4, 2023
Shift to Remote Work Cuts Commutes, Frees Downtown Space for Affordable Housing June 4, 2023
2.7M Hectares Lost, Nova Scotia at Ground Zero in ‘Unprecedented’ Early Wildfire Season June 4, 2023
Is Equinor’s Bay du Nord ‘Delay’ a Cancellation in Slow Motion? June 1, 2023
Next
Prev

Shell ‘Breached Legal Duties’ by Mismanaging Climate Risk, Lawsuit Alleges

March 27, 2022
Reading time: 4 minutes
Primary Author: Compiled by The Energy Mix staff

Catherine Hammond/wikimedia commons

Catherine Hammond/wikimedia commons

7
SHARES
 

European environmental law charity ClientEarth is launching a legal action against colossal fossil Shell and its board of directors, and inviting other Shell shareholders to join the fight.

“We’re arguing that the board’s failure to properly manage climate risk to Shell means that it is breaching its legal duties,” ClientEarth said in a mid-March release that cast the legal action as the first of its kind. “The board has failed to adopt and implement a climate strategy that truly aligns with the Paris Agreement goal to keep global temperature rises to below 1.5°C by 2050.”

  • Concise headlines. Original content. Timely news and views from a select group of opinion leaders. Special extras.
  • Everything you need, nothing you don’t.
  • The Weekender: The climate news you need.
Subscribe

That means the Shell board “is breaching its duties under sections 172 and 174 of the UK Companies Act, which legally requires it to act in a way that promotes the company’s success, and to exercise reasonable care, skill, and diligence,” the organization contends.

“Shell is seriously exposed to the risks of climate change, yet its climate plan is fundamentally flawed,” said ClientEarth climate accountability lawyer Paul Benson. “In failing to properly prepare the company for the net-zero transition, Shell’s board is increasing the company’s vulnerability to climate risk, putting the long-term value of the company in jeopardy.”

In addition to launching the claim, ClientEarth is asking other Shell shareholders to sign on. “ClientEarth is encouraging institutional investors of Shell to support the claim, and—in line with their own fiduciary duties—to use their position to compel the board to adopt a strengthened climate strategy which sufficiently protects against financial losses resulting from climate risk,” the group states.

The Guardian points to the high stakes attached to the case. “If successful, Shell’s board could be forced by the courts to change its strategy, taking specific concrete steps to align its plan with the Paris deal,” the news story states. “But if the claimants lose, they could be liable for the full costs of the case, including directors’ legal fees.”

ClientEarth maintains it has launched the suit in Shell’s own best interest.

“It is highly novel, we’re in uncharted territory here, but we see real merit with this claim,” Benson told the Guardian. “We think, frankly, the longer the board delays with this, the more likely it is that the company is going to have to execute this sort of handbrake turn to retain commercial competitiveness, to meet the challenges of inevitable regulatory developments.”

He added that “Shell is actually really quite exposed to the risks of climate change,” both physical and transitional. “They are exposed to what we call stranded asset risk, where their assets—for example their facilities, their physical infrastructure—the value of that is just going to reduce or it will become a liability as the net-zero transition progresses. And they are exposed to massive write-downs of those assets.”

A Shell spokesperson said the company’s plan to become a net-zero emissions business by 2050 “includes the industry-leading target we have set to halve emissions from our global operations by 2030, and transforming our business to provide more low-carbon energy for customers.” But the formerly Dutch-British fossil has had a tough time backing the spin with substance. In 2019, CEO Ben van Beurden lamented the company had “no choice” but to keep on investing in new fossil exploration projects. Its February, 2021 climate plan had shareholders squirming while climate analysts declared its targets “grotesque” and “delusional”. And an October, 2021 analysis showed the company missing its net-zero goal and increasing emissions 4% through 2030.

In mid-October last year, Scottish climate campaigner Lauren MacDonald confronted van Beurden on the TED Countdown plenary stage, vowing that “we will never forget what you have done and what Shell has done” as the climate emergency became more deadly. A month later, Shell moved its head office out of The Netherlands, just months after a Dutch court ordered it to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions 45% by 2030 in a bruising court decision.

A week before ClientEarth announced its lawsuit, Shell was under a “barrage of criticism” for buying a cargo of crude oil from Russia subsequent to Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, Bloomberg reported. As the month unfolded, the company applied for environmental assessments for 17 gigawatts of wind capacity off the coast of Brazil. But it also released a revised plan to develop the Jackdaw oil and gas field in the North Sea after UK regulators rejected its previous pitch on environmental grounds, and was considering reviving its role in the controversial Cambo development off the Shetland Islands.



in Carbon Levels & Measurement, Climate Denial & Greenwashing, Legal & Regulatory, Oil & Gas, UK & Europe, Wind

The latest climate news and analysis, direct to your inbox

Subscribe

Related Posts

sunrise windmill
International Agencies & Studies

Renewables ‘Set to Soar’ with 440 GW of New Installations in 2023: IEA

June 5, 2023
149
Pixabay
Solar

Greek Industrial Giant Announces 1.4-GW Alberta Solar Farm, Canada’s Biggest

June 4, 2023
130
Clairewych/Pixabay
Buildings

Demand Surges for Giant Heat Pumps as Europe Turns to District Heating

June 4, 2023
89

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

I agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy.

Trending Stories

/MaxPixels

‘Substantial Damage’, No Injuries as Freight Train Hits Wind Turbine Blade

May 25, 2022
14.7k
sunrise windmill

Renewables ‘Set to Soar’ with 440 GW of New Installations in 2023: IEA

June 5, 2023
149
Natural Resources Canada

2.7M Hectares Lost, Nova Scotia at Ground Zero in ‘Unprecedented’ Early Wildfire Season

June 4, 2023
172
Pixabay

Greek Industrial Giant Announces 1.4-GW Alberta Solar Farm, Canada’s Biggest

June 4, 2023
130
debannja/Pixabay

Austin, Texas Council Committee Backs Fossil Non-Proliferation Treaty

June 4, 2023
92
Oregon Department of Transportation/flickr

Shift to Remote Work Cuts Commutes, Frees Downtown Space for Affordable Housing

June 5, 2023
87

Recent Posts

Clairewych/Pixabay

Demand Surges for Giant Heat Pumps as Europe Turns to District Heating

June 4, 2023
89
nicolasdebraypointcom/pixabay

Factor Gender into Transportation Planning, IISD Analyst Urges Policy-Makers

June 4, 2023
39
moerschy / Pixabay

Federal Climate Plans Must Embrace Community-Driven Resilience

June 4, 2023
55
Equinor

Is Equinor’s Bay du Nord ‘Delay’ a Cancellation in Slow Motion?

June 1, 2023
879
Ottawa Renewable Energy Co-op/Facebook

‘Hinge Moment’ for Humanity Demands ‘YIMBY’ Mentality: McKibben

June 1, 2023
79
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rachel_Notley

Notley Would Have Backed Carbon Capture Subsidies, Smith Less Certain: Ex-Pipeline Exec

June 1, 2023
100
Next Post
RudolfSimon/Wikimedia Commons

Shift to Energy Efficiency Could Pressure Putin, Says Conservation Pioneer Lovins

The Energy Mix - The climate news you need

Copyright 2023 © Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

  • About
  • Contact
  • Privacy Policy and Copyright
  • Cookie Policy

Proudly partnering with…

scf_withtagline
No Result
View All Result
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities

Copyright 2022 © Smarter Shift Inc. and Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

Manage Cookie Consent
To provide the best experiences, we use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behaviour or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage vendors Read more about these purposes
View preferences
{title} {title} {title}