US Forest Service Task Force 1600 fighting the 2025 Palisades Forest Fire. Photo by SHF Capt 343 Victor Guillen.
The climate crisis – or the rapid warming of the Earth caused primarily by fossil fuel burning and ecosystem destruction – is upon us. For years, the scientific community warned that the rise in global temperatures would lead to extreme weather events, sea level rise, displacement, and health impacts, putting millions of lives at risk. These impacts are unfolding before us, exposing existing vulnerabilities, reinforcing inequality, and disproportionately impacting marginalized populations. You, the reader, may have already been affected.
While the climate crisis is no longer completely reversible, by significantly reducing greenhouse gas emissions and updating infrastructure, we can prevent and protect from certain harms. The sooner these actions are taken, the more likely it is that we can recover and sustain the planet’s environment. However, governments and corporations are responding too slowly, if at all. Over 70% of greenhouse gas emissions can be attributed to just 100 companies, primarily fossil fuel corporations, with Exxon, Shell, Chevron, and BP comprising the biggest emitters in the U.S. Many governments heavily rely on these fossil fuel companies and pressure from their lobbyists often makes would-be regulators reluctant to enforce backstops.
Scaling up climate civil litigation against corporations, the largest greenhouse gas emitters, can hold them accountable for their actions and mitigate additional harms. Climate change litigation can drive down greenhouse gas emissions; push for better responses to the effects of climate change; or provide compensation to impacted communities. By leveraging the creative potential of the law and prioritizing legally viable, replicable, and impactful strategies, litigators may be able to secure remedies that effectively change corporate behavior and create institutional change.
The climate crisis calls for an all-hands-on-deck response, and litigators from various fields have a critical role to play. For those still on the fence about whether to get involved, here are five reasons why now is the time to bring your unique skill set to the climate fight.
1. Climate harms are already impacting many parts of the US, and your community could be next.
In January 2025, the world witnessed wildfires devastate the Los Angeles and San Diego areas of California. The wildfires destroyed over 18,000 homes and other buildings, burned more than 57,000 acres of land, and forced over 200,000 people to evacuate. It also generated nine billion pounds of toxic ash. Climate change has increased the likelihood of wildfires by one-third. The 2025 wreckage in California is part of a decades-long trend of increasing frequency and severity of wildfires in the American West as a result of climate change. We know how we got here. As the Union of Concerned Scientists notes, “[n]early 20 million acres of burned forest land can be traced to emissions from the world’s 88 largest fossil fuel producers and cement manufacturers.”
But it’s not just wildfires putting communities at risk. Heavy rainfall and flash flooding devastated Central Texas in July 2025, resulting in the loss of over 100 lives (including over 20 children), dozens of people missing, and millions of dollars in property damage. Climate change significantly contributed to the destruction. Before the flooding, the area experienced extreme drought conditions, made worse by climate change. The dry soil washed away more easily, so when the heavy rainfall–intensified by increased moisture in response to a warming environment–came, flooding was exacerbated.
These types of extreme weather events are becoming more common as human (corporate) activities significantly increase greenhouse gas emissions. The data depicts a significant rise in death tolls and multi-billion-dollar damages from heatwaves, heavy rainfall, droughts, wildfires, and hurricanes. We’re still at the precipice–heatwaves are predicted to become longer and hotter throughout the United States. Wildfires are likely to intensify on the West Coast and storms and floods will increase in the East and Southeast. Without sufficient adaptation measures in place, this is likely to cause detrimental impacts across the country, with few communities left unscathed.
The vast majority of greenhouse gas emissions are attributable to the private sector, potentially exposing corporations to liability for these increasingly common extreme weather events.
2. A flood of litigation can change corporate behavior for the benefit of us all.
Corporate capture of key government actors and the spread of misinformation by companies around climate action is widespread, resulting in government climate initiatives being insufficient or under-resourced. As such, climate litigation to date has primarily targeted state actors rather than corporations. Corporations have seen few consequences for their role in climate change and continue to emit at high levels as a result. However, it is vital that swift climate action takes place against corporations to deter emissions and allocate costs to those most responsible for the harm.
As companies and governments fail to act, litigators can leverage the law to change corporate behavior and institutional norms. If claims succeed plaintiffs can obtain judicial orders that force corporate actors to revise greenwashing claims or disclose climate risks related to their products. Successful claims can also secure injunctions that lead to emission reduction mandates, climate adaptation programs, and market corrections and restructuring. Climate litigation can also result in systemic change by prompting policy changes and compelling legislative bodies to act. Furthermore, litigation may be used as a tool to further recognize human rights norms and obligations, including the internationally-recognized right to a healthy environment and state responsibilities to uphold standards and take preventative and mitigative action.
Ultimately, a flood of climate litigation could indirectly impact fossil fuel emitters under a “death by a thousand cuts” hypothesis. Numerous legal actions could tie corporations up in continued litigation, which would adversely affect their profit margins and lead to normative pressure to alter harmful behavior. Scaling up climate litigation will also help set legal precedents and strengthen global norms around climate change and corporate actor responsibility. This is necessary as climate litigation, particularly against private actors, is fairly new, and has no straight-forward formula or single path to victory. As an evolving area of law with many potential directions, we need the best and the brightest litigators to support innovation in this field.
3. Companies have lied to the public about their climate contributions, and you can help hold them accountable.
The biggest corporate emitters also play a significant role in climate deception, the intentional misrepresentation of climate science or climate-related corporate actions to manipulate public opinion and obstruct effective climate action. Fossil fuel corporations knew about the climate damages associated with the production and consumption of their products for decades. Evidence suggests they intentionally deceived the public through targeted marketing and the coordinated spread of disinformation. Some companies even suppressed climate science and promoted misleading claims about the environmental sustainability of their products.
Fossil fuel corporations' climate deception is reminiscent of Big Tobacco and Big Pharma’s deceit around the addictive nature and adverse health impacts associated with tobacco and opioid use, potentially providing a helpful blueprint for climate litigation. In both the Big Tobacco and opioid litigation contexts, claimants successfully used public nuisance, racketeering, and fraud claims to detail companies’ coordinated illegal activities and extensive disinformation campaigns. The Big Tobacco lawsuits led to the 1998 Master Settlement Agreement, billion-dollar payments, and marketing restrictions; and triggered subsequent regulations and policy changes to protect public health. Likewise, cases against Big Pharma in the wake of the opioid crisis resulted in multi-billion-dollar settlements to support addiction treatment, prevention, and recovery programs.
The Big Tobacco and opioid settlements also forced the release of internal documents, proving companies knew about the risks associated with their products and lied anyway, as well as transparency provisions to prevent future crises. Climate litigators may seek similar transparency from defendants or seek discovery to expose deceptive practices amongst fossil fuel corporations. Litigators could use similar strategies to hold corporations accountable for their alleged coordinated efforts in deception, spreading disinformation, and hindering climate science.
4. Making companies pay can compensate those most impacted by climate change and be profitable for your firm.
Corporate climate litigation can result in significant damages for the harmed parties, making corporations bear the cost of the harms they caused. Claimants can seek steep damages to compensate vulnerable communities who, in many cases, have lost their livelihoods, their homes, and their health. Given that extreme weather events have had devastating economic impacts, these damages could also result in high contingency fees for litigators and serve as a deterrent for corporate misbehavior. With sufficient evidentiary links backed by science, cases may also result in significant settlement agreements, which could include compensatory damages and injunctive relief similar to those from tobacco and opioid litigations. Litigation can serve as an opportunity to obtain redress for specific, harmed parties, and be a forum to create structural change.
5. Litigation can help reclaim the narrative about climate harms and their impacts on vulnerable communities.
Documentation of corporate contributions to the climate crisis and its real impacts on actual people offers factual anchors and establishes the human connection that science alone often misses. While litigation has the potential for impact in and of itself, major lawsuits can also attract media attention to challenge prevailing narratives. Thus, litigation can indirectly shift public opinion around climate responsibility by framing this crisis around human rights, justice, and ensuring future generations live in safety. Climate change disproportionately impacts marginalized populations, including those from low-income communities, Indigenous communities and other communities of color, fishing communities, the youth, and people with disabilities. While these communities have not historically controlled the climate change narrative, climate movements and lawsuits are emerging that highlight intergenerational justice. More litigation can bring their stories to the forefront.
Climate litigation is also an opportunity to document harms, raise awareness, assert the rights of nature, and create a mechanism for reparations. By centering impacted communities and reclaiming the narrative, litigators can also build political pressure to hold corporate actors accountable and champion justice with consideration for the world we leave behind for future generations.
Litigators have a uniquely powerful role to play in the climate fight because the law is one of the strongest tools available for driving meaningful change. We hope you will join the climate fight and assist in securing a safer, more sustainable future!
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You can also read a shortened version of this piece on the Business and Human Rights Centre opinions’ page.
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Siju Falade is a staff attorney at CAL.
About Corporate Accountability Lab
Corporate Accountability Lab (CAL) is a legal non-profit organization that unleashes the creative potential of the law to protect people and the planet from corporate abuse. We develop new and under-utilized strategies to hold companies accountable for harming communities. This has traditionally been across international supply chains, but CAL recently launched a Corporate Climate Liability program where we use creative processes and design thinking to identify legal strategies that can be utilized against corporations for their role in climate harm.
