Legal Risks Seen Accelerating Climate Adaptation Plans (1)

Countries that fall short in efforts to limit global warming to 1.5°C face growing legal risks that could push them to accelerate climate adaptation efforts.

The threat of lawsuits now looms over companies and governments that don’t take aggressive climate action, following an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice, said Winston Chow, a professor of urban climate at Singapore Management University.

“This acceleration of the momentum from the legal side would help with the business impetus toward climate adaptation and mitigation,” he said at the Bloomberg Sustainable Business Summit in Singapore on Wednesday.