EU sued for gas imports tied to high methane emissions
A landmark court ruling earlier this year found that European governments must act on climate. A new lawsuit targets a lack of limits on gas imports.
A new lawsuit alleges that the European Union has failed to limit gas imports that are linked to high methane emissions.
The Global Legal Action Network (GLAN), a legal NGO based in Ireland, filed its lawsuit in the Court of Justice of the European Union, seeking to compel the EU to impose limits on high-methane-emitting gas imports.
The case comes after a landmark ruling earlier this year in the European Court of Human Rights that found that European countries must combat climate change in order to protect human rights.
GLAN hopes to extend that vision to gas imports, and its new case is the first to specifically target methane.
“The EU is promoting imports of gas to Europe without any limits on methane emissions linked to its production,” said Gerry Liston, a senior lawyer with GLAN. “This is a clear-cut violation of the EU’s human rights obligations.”
Gas and LNG are often cited as an intermediate or temporary climate solution. But as Gas Outlook previously reported, recent research indicates that LNG has a worse climate impact than coal, due to high methane emissions across the supply chain.
The EU has adopted its Methane Regulation, which would limit imports of gas with high methane intensity. The gas industry sees those rules as shaking up the global gas market, although their efficacy remains to be seen. For the next few years, companies will only need to begin reporting their emissions. The rules do not take full effect until 2030.
The lawsuit alleges that the EU is not doing enough.
“Up to 90 percent of methane emissions associated with fossil fuels consumed in the EU occur before they reach EU borders. The EU is liable for these emissions,” said Kim O’Dowd, a climate campaigner at the Environmental Investigation Agency. “Rather than adopting effective mitigation measures across the supply chain, policymakers have opted for an undefined, untested methane intensity standard to be enforced by 2030—a deadline that’s too late and, based on past experience, likely ineffective.”