Greenpeace is suing Volkswagen over climate crisis

Protests in Berlin: According to environmentalists, Volkswagen AG should get out of the combustion engine faster

Photo:

FABRIZIO BENSCH / REUTERS

Environmentalists from Greenpeace Germany are suing Volkswagen AG because the group wants to emit too much CO₂.

With its emissions, the car manufacturer is "making a significant contribution to the climate crisis and its consequences," according to Greenpeace.

VW's business model cannot be reconciled with the goal of limiting the global temperature increase to 1.5 degrees.

Greenpeace directors Martin Kaiser and Roland Hipp filed the lawsuit together with Clara Mayer, an activist from Fridays For Future.

There are precedents

In doing so, they are based, among other things, on a ruling by the Federal Constitutional Court.

In April 2021, the Karlsruhe judges ruled that future generations have a right to climate protection: their freedom and property rights are threatened by climate change.

According to its own information, Greenpeace also supports the identical lawsuit filed by an organic farmer in another German regional court.

And there is another role model: In May, a court in the Netherlands condemned Shell to be more environmentally friendly.

In the lawsuit, Greenpeace demands, among other things, that the group end the sale of vehicles with combustion engines worldwide by 2030 at the latest.

If the lawsuit were successful, a good two gigatons less CO₂ should be emitted by 2040, say the environmentalists.

The lawsuit does not come as a surprise: at the beginning of September, Deutsche Umwelthilfe (DUH) and Greenpeace took legal action against four German corporations to oblige them to do more climate protection.

BMW, Mercedes-Benz and VW as well as the oil and gas company Wintershall Dea were sent cease and desist letters.

At the end of October, VW rejected the legal request to reduce its CO₂ emissions more quickly.

VW rejects legal responsibility

From VW's point of view, disputes in civil courts through lawsuits against individual companies are not the right way to do justice to this task.

The company has clearly committed itself to the Paris Climate Agreement and wants to be CO₂-neutral in terms of its balance sheet by 2050 at the latest.

It was also the responsibility of the legislature to shape climate protection, it said last.

"A huge CO₂ emitter like Volkswagen has to bow to international climate targets and the ruling from Karlsruhe," said Greenpeace boss Kaiser on the sidelines of the climate conference in Glasgow.

"VW can only make its contribution to limiting the global temperature increase to 1.5 degrees with a quick goodbye to the combustion engine."

VW, the world's second largest car manufacturer, refuses to present a strategy based on a residual CO₂ budget that is compatible with the 1.5 degree target, according to the Greenpeace announcement.

In order to meet the budget, the group must reduce its CO₂ footprint by at least 65 percent by 2030 compared to 2018, combustion engines are likely to make up only a quarter of all VW cars sold by then and will no longer be put on the market from 2030.

jlk / dpa / AFP