The lawsuit by farmer Hugues Falys is the first time a citizen in Belgium has brought a case against a multinational company – Copyright AFP JOHN THYS<\/p>\n
Matthieu DEMEESTERE<\/p>\n
A Belgian judge will rule Wednesday in a closely watched case pitting French oil giant TotalEnergies against a farmer seeking compensation for damage to his farm caused by climate change.<\/p>\n
Hugues Falys, a farmer from Belgium\u2019s western Hainaut region, was backed by environmental groups including Greenpeace in the David-versus-Goliath case they hope could prove a turning point in the climate fight.<\/p>\n
Together they took TotalEnergies to court on the grounds the French group is Belgium\u2019s leading refiner and distributor of petroleum products, launching the country\u2019s first climate case brought against a multinational company.<\/p>\n
The plaintiffs argue the firm can be held liable for global warming because of emissions generated when its products are burned \u2014 a claim rejected by TotalEnergies which accuses pressure groups of \u201cinstrumentalising the judiciary.\u201d<\/p>\n
The lawsuit was filed in 2024 before the Tournai business court in western Belgium, and argued over a series of hearings between November and January, with a verdict due at 2:00 pm (1300 GMT) on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe judges have everything they need to make the right decision,\u201d Falys told AFP.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut it won\u2019t be black and white, given the number of issues to be decided,\u201d added the farmer, who also serves as spokesman for an agricultural union.<\/p>\n
Contacted by AFP, TotalEnergies declined to comment ahead of the ruling.<\/p>\n
Falys is seeking 130,000 euros ($150,000) in damages for four extreme weather events that struck his farm between 2016 and 2020.<\/p>\n
First a storm destroyed his strawberry and potato crops, then three periods of drought hurt fodder production, affecting cattle in turn.<\/p>\n
But the farmer and his backers are also seeking much broader action from TotalEnergies on countering climate change \u2014 notably for it to stop investing in new fossil-fuel projects.<\/p>\n
\u2013 Frequent target \u2013<\/p>\n
The goals of the lawsuit are \u201creparation and transformation\u201d, said Belgium\u2019s human rights league (LDH), which is backing the complaint alongside Greenpeace and food\u2011rights organisation FIAN.<\/p>\n
Making its case in court, the company called it \u201cabsurd\u201d to single out a particular firm over the pace of the energy transition \u2014 arguing that it accounts for less than two percent of the oil and gas sector.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a bit easy to blame energy producers for pollution and warming,\u201d argued company lawyer Francoise Labrousse back in December, stressing the overarching role of governments in steering climate policy.<\/p>\n
\u201cTotalEnergies doesn\u2019t sell tractors, cars or boilers,\u201d Labrousse argued, describing the group\u2019s strategy to meet the EU\u2019s goal of carbon neutrality by 2050 as \u201cambitious and effective\u201d.<\/p>\n
TotalEnergies is a frequent target of climate and human rights activists, along with other oil giants.<\/p>\n
In 2021, Dutch courts issued a landmark ruling ordering Anglo\u2011Dutch giant Shell to cut its net carbon emissions, finding they contributed to global warming and its harmful effects.<\/p>\n
But the judgement was overturned three years later, when an appeals court found that an NGO and individual citizens could not make such demands.<\/p>\n
The case, known as \u201cPeople vs. Shell\u201d, is now before the Dutch Supreme Court.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The lawsuit by farmer Hugues Falys is the first time a citizen in Belgium has brought a case…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6826,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[312,2827,7,4926,4927,115,4928,2831],"class_list":{"0":"post-6825","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-belgium","8":"tag-agriculture","9":"tag-belgique","10":"tag-belgium","11":"tag-climat","12":"tag-energie","13":"tag-france","14":"tag-petrole","15":"tag-proces"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@be\/116249194925563409","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6825","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6825"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6825\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6826"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6825"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6825"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6825"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}