Climate change, the Supreme Court legitimises the trial of Eni, Mef and Cdp

The climate issue bursts into the courtrooms with two decisions on the Rome-The Hague axis, taken just a few hours apart, which are likely to direct the jurisprudence of the coming years.

The United Civil Sections of the Cassazione (sentence 20381/2025 filed on 21 July) recognised the jurisdiction of ordinary courts on the subject of damage caused by climate change - legitimising both the role of associations representing interests such as Greenpeace and that of individual citizens - while the International Court of Justice in The Hague (UN Supreme Court) stated that countries must comply with their climate obligations and non-compliance opens the way for international litigation (with other countries) for climate damage compensation.

Greenpeace, ReCommon and 12 other citizens had sued, before the Court of Rome, Eni, the Ministry of Economy and Finance and the Cassa Depositi e Prestiti, for 'non-compliance' with the obligations to achieve the 'internationally recognised' climate objectives and for liability for pecuniary and non-pecuniary damage caused by climate change, requesting that Eni be ordered to limit annual CO2 emissions 'arising from its industrial and commercial activities and from the energy transport products it sells', and further requesting that the Ministry and Cassa be ordered to adopt operational policies to define and monitor Eni's climate objectives. The Ministry and Cassa Depositi e Prestiti were cited not in their capacity as public administrations/entities, but in their capacity as shareholders of the former state-owned company.

According to the plaintiffs, the three defendants at trial have substantiallyviolated legal obligations arising from the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, which entered into force on 21 March 1994; the Copenhagen Accord of 2009, which set the global temperature increase required to reach the target below 2°; by the Cancun Agreements of 2016, on cuts in global greenhouse gas emissions; by the Resolution 10/4 of 2009 of the UN Human Rights Council, which held that climate change is a human rights threat to those in vulnerable positions; the Paris Agreement of 12 December 2015 (Law 4 November 2016, no. 204); and finally by the commitments made in the Glasgow and Sharm el-Sheik Conferences, and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's AR6 synthesis report of March 2023.

According to the application, Eni is identified asresponsible for 0.6% of global industrial emissions and greenhouse gas emissions of 419 million tonnes of CO2 in 2022, and although bound by the code of ethics to respect the Paris Agreement, "it has adopted a strategy that is not in line with the indications of the scientific community", adopting a decarbonisation plan to 2050 that "contemplates a reduction in emissions of just 35% by 2030". Hence, the complained damage from "injury to the right to life and to respect for private and family life"and, on the other hand, to the duties of intervention provided for by international sources on the subject of contrast.