French oil major TotalEnergies must disclose the climate risks linked to emissions from its oil and gas products and set out plans to mitigate them, a Paris court ruled on Thursday.
The ruling is a partial victory for climate change NGOs seeking to apply France’s 2017 corporate duty of vigilance law to climate change. However, the court stopped short of ordering specific measures such as limiting overseas exploration and production or setting binding emissions reduction targets.
Climate litigation against oil majors has produced mixed results in recent years. A landmark Dutch ruling ordering Shell SHEL.L to cut emissions was later overturned on appeal and is under review by the Netherlands Supreme Court.
Total Must Provide an Updated Plan
The Paris Judicial Court said in a press release summarizing the ruling that the climate risks related to company activity were within the scope of the duty of vigilance law.
“The law does not mean to render companies responsible for those risks, which result from all human activity on the planet since the industrial revolution, but asks them to act according to their situation,” it said.
“Extracting, refining and marketing of a barrel of oil inevitably leads to its combustion,” the court added in detailing why Total played a role in clients’ emissions.
TotalEnergies must present an updated vigilance plan to the court for review in six months. If judges find its measures insufficient to reduce Scope 3 emissions — those emitted when clients use its fuel products — it could order Total to take additional steps.
The company did not immediately reply to a request for comment on whether it would appeal. Earlier on Thursday, Total said it did not believe the law should apply to climate risks nor that it should be required to address Scope 3 emissions.
A coalition of NGOs including Association SHERPA, Notre Affaire à Tous, France Nature Environnement as well as the city of Paris filed the case in 2020, arguing TotalEnergies’ oil and gas business conflicts with climate goals and breaches its duty to identify and avoid environmental harm.
In a statement, the coalition said the ruling was a victory.
“While TotalEnergies argued that Scope 3 emissions are those of its consumers, the court recognized that the company has leverage to cut these emissions,” it said. “We will continue the fight to make sure this happens.”
The suit was initially declared inadmissible in 2023, but that decision was overturned on appeal. French prosecutors, acting as an interested party, had argued the duty of vigilance law was not intended to cover climate change.
(Reporting by America Hernandez in Paris; editing by Inti Landauro, Mark Potter and Barbara Lewis)
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