We are, of course, doing it to ourselves. Warming up the planer that is. To live is to burn fuel and human beings are burning a lot of it, far too much as fossil fuels. We are, each and every one of us fossil fuel burners, contributing to more and bigger storms, floods and droughts; rising sea levels.; more acidic oceans and changing ocean currents. To a climate crisis. We are unleashing a cascade of catastrophes that threatens to bring civilization down around our ears.

Some of us are much more to blame than others, some responsible for a lot of greenhouse gasses, some for very little. A fair-minded person might suggest that justice should hold those most responsible to account. After all, environmental science has firmly established the grim path that profligate fossil-fuel burning has put us on.

Last month the International Court of Justice (ICJ) fastened this science to law. The court, the judicial branch of the United Nations, recognized for the first time that solving the climate crisis or atoning for its devastating consequences requires confronting its main cause: the burning of fossil fuels.

A unanimous ruling by the court’s 15 judges stated that countries are obligated to protect their citizens from the “urgent and existential threat” of climate change. If they fail to curb greenhouse gas emissions caused by the production or consumption of fossil fuels, or approve new exploration, or subsidize fossil fuel industries, they may be held liable for “an internationally wrongful act.” International law allows for governments to sue other governments for reparations where they fail to act.

A number of significant emitters, including Australia, the U.S. and China, argued in submissions to the court that their obligations were limited to complying with the Paris Accords and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. The ICJ disagreed. It ruled all countries had binding obligations to act not just under UN climate agreements but also under international human rights law, the law of the sea and customary international law.

The court’s ruling reinforced earlier decisions by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, which declared that the climate crisis is a human rights emergency; and the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea which affirmed that greenhouse gas emissions pollute the marine environment and countries have a duty to prevent environmental harm that affects other nations.

Climate litigation has also reached high courts in various nations. According to the London School of Economics, 276 climate-related cases have been heard in supreme and constitutional courts around the world since 2015, including in the United States, Great Britain and Norway. Cases have been from both directions, both challenging and promoting climate action. 

The case before the ICJ was brought by the South Pacific archipelago nation of Vanuatu and other climate-vulnerable countries, with the help of Pacific Island students, i.e. by people who are watching their countries slowly disappear below rising seas.

As an Albertan, resident of Canada’s pollution province, I am more than a little intrigued by the court’s decision. Our premier is determined to peddle more fossil fuels, and our prime minister is sympathetic, so does this ruling imply they are inviting lawsuits by victims of climate change? They are well-advised to carefully consider the legal ramifications before proceeding with projects.

And how about the Trump administration? It is not only terminating the U.S. fight against climate change, it is actively pursuing policies that expand the emission of greenhouse gasses. Facing international legal action would seem fitting for a president already familiar with lawsuits both civil and criminal.

In any case, the ICJ has no enforcement arm, so Danielle Smith and Donald Trump are not about to be subpoenaed to face justice in a climate court. Nonetheless, this and other rulings have established that countries have duties to prevent and remedy climate harm, rooted in principles of law. Governments now have greater justification for establishing tough emissions laws and have been strengthened in their ability to defend themselves against lawsuits by companies seeking redress for climate measures that restrict their fossil fuel projects. The ruling makes it much harder for governments and companies to say the rules don’t apply to them or they don’t have to act.

As the toll of climate change rolls on, justice demands that big polluters be held to account. That the law is recognizing this presents at least one note of optimism in a world of cascading catastrophes.