Greenpeace The Netherlands v Netherlands (Bonaire case)

In this second episode of Between Heat and Hope, Phillip Paiement, Professor of Law & Governance in the Anthropocene at Tilburg Law School, discusses the Bonaire case of 28 January 2026 with Christina Eckes, professor of European Law at the University of Amsterdam. The conversations covers the adaptation and mitigation aspects of the judgment.

In relation to adaptation, it draws out the particular situation of the residents of Bonaire as compared to the resident of the State of the Netherlands, reflects on the missed opportunity to engage more with the colonial history of the claims in this case, and concludes that the case may serve as basis for future litigation by plaintiffs from the Caribbean Netherlands, including not only the special municipalities like Bonaire but potentially also the autonomous constituent countries. More broadly, it offers a basis for equality claims grounded in geographical vulnerability.

Concerning mitigation, the discussion covers the judgment’s grounding in the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR)’s KlimaSeniorinnen judgment (2024), the relative absence of the Advisory Opinion (AO) of International Court of Justice on States’ Obligations in Respect to Climate Change (2025), and the District Court’s engagement with fair share. It comes to the conclusion that the Bonaire case applies the budget logic of KlimaSeniorinnen and the ICJ’s AO but could have more clearly developed its express requirement that the State of the Netherlands quantifies its emission allowances as part of the global emission budget that keeps global warming below 1.5°C.

References

Bonaire Case (Dutch with links to the English translation)

KlimaSeniorinnen

ICJ AO on climate change

Urgenda

TransLitigate, Phillip Paiement PI (ERC Starting Grant 2021)

Suggestions

Katherina Pistor, The Law of Capitalism and How to Transform It (Yale University Press, 2025).

John Vaillant, Fire Weather (Alfred A. Knopf Publishing, 2023).

Editing: Clara Kammeringer

Music: “Delayed Flight” by Michael Ramir C. via mixkit

Recorded at the University of Amsterdam, January 2026

The LitDem Project

This project has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement n° 101087994).

10 Years of Climate Litigation

In this first episode of Between Heat and Hope, Simon Waswa, PhD researcher at the University of Amsterdam is joined by Dennis van Berkel, Legal Counsel of the Urgenda Foundation and Strategic Advisor at the Climate Litigation Network (CLN). The conversation begins by taking stock of CLN’s 10-year anniversary since the landmark Urgenda decision. This decision marked the first time a court ordered the State to do its part in the fight against climate change. The discussion then delves into the legal architecture that has been cumulatively built from the bottom up through the different climate cases from Urgenda to KlimaSeniorinnen to the International Court of Justice’s Advisory Opinion (ICJ AO) on climate change.

The conversation closes with reflections on the future of climate litigation and the democratic legitimacy of courts as they continue to hold States and corporate actors to account amid political backlash and an accelerating climate crisis.

References

CLN “Ten Years Climate Litigation” report

Urgenda

KlimaSeniorinnen

ICJ AO on climate change

Andre et al. (2025) – 89% study (see also here)

Editing: Clara Kammeringer

Music: “Delayed Flight” by Michael Ramir C. via mixkit

Recorded at the University of Amsterdam, January 2026

The LitDem Project

This project has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement n° 101087994).