Court rules Germany needs *more carbon action*. Who cares what voters think? Young people have right to climate protection.

How to wreck a democracy: Let judges decide complex national policies based on who sues first. What could possibly go wrong?

German climate change law violates rights, court rules

BBC

Germany’s climate change laws are insufficient and violate fundamental freedoms by putting the burden of curbing CO2 emissions on the young, its highest court has ruled.

It says the law fails to give enough detail on cutting CO2 emissions after current targets end in 2030. “The provisions irreversibly offload major emission reduction burdens on to periods after 2030,” it found.

Like the EU legislation, Germany’s domestic climate change law provides for a 55% reduction in greenhouse gases by 2030.

But the German Constitutional Court said on Thursday that current measures “violate the freedoms of the complainants, some of whom are still very young” because they delay too much of the action needed to reach the Paris targets until after 2030.

Since when did young people have right to be protected from climate change?

It’s time for other young people to sue the court, and the government.  Germany’s climate change laws are wildly expensive and pointless, and will have no measurable benefit.  Expensive electricity will create an unfair debt-burden on the young. It will slow or break the economy, destroy jobs and harm the environment. That’s a violation of their human rights.

Young people could sue governments for not doing due diligence on a UN committee report and for selling out their civilization.

Let it rip, commenters.

Photo German wind turbines, Emben. Emden, Germany by Gritte

Emden, Germany by Gritte

See also The Guardian: for more info.

9.8 out of 10 based on 78 ratings

121 comments to Court rules Germany needs *more carbon action*. Who cares what voters think? Young people have right to climate protection.

  • #
    Don B

    Repeating from a previous post:

    As the German court rules that Germany is not doing enough to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, the reality is that whatever Germany or the EU or the US or Australia do about emissions is pointless, even if CO2 were the climate control knob.

    Oxford has a nice graph which shows, to my eyeballs, that during the recent 15 years ALL of the increase of CO2 emissions was generated by China, India and other Asian nations. Those countries have chosen to grow, and not commit economic suicide.

    https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/annual-co-emissions-by-region.pn

    260

    • #

      Don

      That came up ‘not found’

      Have you another link

      50

    • #
      William Astley

      This graph shows how CO2 emission reduction in the US is offset by CO2 emission increases in China. Same holds true for Germany.

      https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/annual-co2-emissions-per-country-7.png

      So reductions in the US and German CO2 emissions do not reduce the total human CO2 emissions because all of the manufacturing is moving to China were energy is cheap, labor is cheap (no unions, long hours, six day work weeks) and there are no CO2 taxes.

      The German courts are clueless about what happens when a country legislates a scam, that does not/will not work for basic engineering reasons. German energy is going to become more and more expensive and less reliable. Eventually something must give or all of the manufacturing/people will leave Germany.

      330

    • #
      Richard Ilfeld

      SO leave them alone. Liberals are in favor of assisted suicide.
      In fact, there is, to my mind some justification for simply doing what the left does in terms of descriptive vocabulary.
      Reduction of CO2 is desertification as green plants starve to death, it is economic suicide for business; it is falling off the ladder from poverty into the middle class as good paying jobs jobs are replaced with menial ones. Your favorite shade tree will suffer slow asphyxiation and shrivel and die win the baking sun for lack of nutrition as we selfishly deny it food……

      20

  • #
    Yonniestone.

    The young won’t have to worry about future CO2 emissions as,
    1: The planet is slowly releasing more CO2 into the atmosphere despite shutting down industries during covid lock downs.
    2: The constant erosion/bastardization of the legal system will leave them with little industry or reliable energy to use.
    3: Their rights will no longer exist under an ideological system that claims to protect them but in reality represses them.
    4: Never in the history of humanity has a totalitarian regime ceded control because it was the right thing to do for its young.

    390

    • #
      • #
        Yonniestone.

        Same system different mask.

        80

        • #
          Speedy

          Hi Yonnie. I’m just a dumb engineer, so I can’t tell the difference between a Nazi concentration camp and a nice Soviet gulag.

          The political ideals are just the stalking horse the dictators use to get their hands on the power. After that, left wing or right wing, totalitarian rule always ends up the same. As CS Lewis put it, all the tyrants and despots have this dull monotony about them.

          Cheers,

          Mike

          230

    • #
      sophocles

      I also don’t think civilization will survive.

      We’ve been distracted by a non-problem too long to be able to recognise a real, very dangerous one, and do anything about it.

      We should be building coal and nuclear (LFTR) generators in quantity where they’re needed. Grids won’t work.

      Excursions We Have Known:
      =========================
      Here’s a table of Geomagnetic Excursions for the last 100 millenia or so from Ben Davidson:

      Gothenburg:.. ~12,000 years ago. Viciousness: 8/10 (Severe — see Younger Dryas for climate)
      Lake Mungo:.. 24-20,000 years ago…………….4/10
      Lake Mono:… 33-37,000 years ago …………….5/10
      Laschamp:…..41-46,000 years ago …………….8/10 (Severe)
      Vostok (Greenland) 60,000 years ago ………….5/10
      Toba:…………72,000 years ago ………………..9/10 (Extreme)
      ………………..84,000
      ………………..96,000
      Blake:………..105,000-115,000 years ago …….8/10 (Severe)

      the two periods shown between Blake and Toba either didn’t happen or no evidence for them has been found.
      The Gothenburg, Laschamp, Toba and Blake excursions stand out in the Geological record. The Lake Mungo, Mono Lake and Vostok/Greenland events were mild in comparison. The further away in time we go the less the evidence is recognisable.

      If the “pattern” holds for the incoming one, could be 4/10. With the speed we have been reacting to this emergency — like not at all — it would good luck for the Human Species. But don’t expect any Global Warming before the end of this century and maybe not for several centuries after. Good news, eh?

      10

    • #
      sophocles

      There was a lot happening around 12,000 YA. The Comet Research Group is a good resource.

      https://cometresearchgroup.org

      10

    • #
      Sceptical Sam

      The The National Socialist Party (Fascists) were never defeated in Deutschland.

      https://youtu.be/lv0jav4lNsk?t=31

      They went to ground, to emerge two generations later.

      50

      • #
        OriginalSteve

        So when the courts rule that everyone has a right o demand Germany is crashed nose first into the ground to destroy it, you know the Hand of Madness is running amok.

        This is the end game for globalists in play – the final result will be the UN locking the world into an eco straight jacket that it can never escape from until all the globalists responsible are rounded up and locked up.

        Dont forget we still have to survive the globalist built and delivered vaccines, which in the long run will likely be way worse than any virus they have also produced…..I would expect the next vaccine to be the truly tnasty one and potentially deliberately lethal.

        What we are in now is the final test run for the globalists “end solution” for its massive 95% earths depopulation agenda. This is just the polishing of the prcoess.

        I suspect of global conflicts get going ( also globalist engineered ) then under the cover of WW3 all manner of “troublemakers” could be rounded up and “dealt with”.

        From a Christian perspective , I’m not ruling out Last Days also being in the frame. The vaccine passport is a horrific confiscation of liberties and freedoms and must be resisted. It appears the vaccine passport was the ultimate objective, they just needed a convenient “crisis” to allow all forms of globalist thuggery to be permitted by globalists handlers of company CEOs and govt people to allow a global take over to occur…..and they have almost pulled it off.

        Fight for your freedoms now, or our great grandchildren will grow up as slaves…..

        70

        • #
          Sceptical Sam

          I’m not too sure about the “last days” prophecy, however, I am concerned that what we are seeing in Germany is not random incompetence. History cycles.

          Think of the history of the rise of the Fascists in the 1920-30s. The Weimar Republic was trashed by the socialists of the left (Spartacus League) along with the German economy. Out of that we saw the rise of the right wing national socialists.

          Today, the German green socialists are similarly on the way to trashing the German economy. They are, of course, being manipulated. The response to that trashing will probably be similar to that of the 1930s: the resurrection of the national socialist extremist right. They are awakening. Thesis. Antithesis. Synthesis.

          This will not end well for Europe.

          30

          • #
            Frank from NoVA

            Sam,

            Left-wing = centralization / collectivism and coerced action

            Right-wing = decentralization / individualism and voluntary action

            Socialists of all flavors love it when people refer to national socialists as “right wingers” – makes it easy for them to denigrate classical liberals, libertarians and others opposed to tyranny.

            30

            • #
              Disco Stu

              In the German sense he is correct, they sat on the right wing of parliament (seating arrangement). Notably, where they sit in parliament does not reflect what their core values and methods are, hence, you are also correct. In the modern sense, Nazis were totalitarian leftists.

              10

  • #

    Since leftists think they are experts on climate science, and engineering, and medicine — self proclaimed experts on just about everything — it’s impossible to teach them anything about an electric grid.

    But when the renewables become unreliables, WHERE LEFTISTS LIVE, they might notice a “slight” problem = no electricity.

    Unfortunately, I believe the world needs MORE California-style, Texas-style and Australian-style (sorry folks) blackouts so even leftists realize there is a problem with unreliable renewables.

    Here in the US, lucky me got caught in three major blackouts:
    Northeast Blackout (1965), New York City (1977) and the
    Northeast Blackout of (2003) …

    During the 1965 blackout, my Dad, who was an electrician, said ‘People never appreciate reliable electricity until they lose it’

    420

    • #
      Hanrahan

      #Peter Fitz

      How do you dismiss these supply failures and the possibility of a BLACK start as “meaningless engineers’ talk”? It seems you do, you remain totally unimpressed.

      10

      • #
        OriginalSteve

        I doubt fitz knows one end of a shovel from another, let alone technology. Dont waste your breath.

        Lefties are supremely ignorant in most things, but are reliable , easily programmed goats.

        20

      • #
        sophocles

        It means he doesn’t understand what’s being said.

        10

    • #
      Analitik

      the world needs MORE California-style, Texas-style and Australian-style (sorry folks) blackouts so even leftists realize there is a problem with unreliable renewables

      I agree. Sadly, the only people who learnt from the 2016 South Australian statewide blackout were the grid engineers. They now know that they have to be willing to blackout major urban areas in order to prevent a total grid collapse (since bringing those areas back up is far easier and quicker than a blackstart).

      This means our grids will be far less resilient and recovery that much more difficult and slower when the next total blackout occurs due to the further reduction of dependable, dispatchable generation.

      30

  • #

    Unbelieveable, but its not.

    So lets pretend that CO2 is actually a problem.
    So Germany turns itself off, and what happens? CO2 levels go up virtually unchanged.
    So Australia turns itself off, and CO2 levels go up with even lesser impact
    So China and India turn themselves off – and here is where its important. CO2 levels still rise virtually unchanged.

    Murry Salby and others have showed that man made CO2 is only be responsible for a fraction of the rise we have seen. During covid in 2020 with industrial output down, less flights, less CO2 – no change in CO2 level rise.

    This has to be the up there with the most completely stupid decisions in history. But then the Left has never shown any brains, so back to the comment at the start – unbelieveable, but its not.

    430

    • #
      Klem

      “This has to be the up there with the most completely stupid decisions in history. But then the Left has never shown any brains…”

      The Left often make stupid decisions but if you don’t like those decisions, history has shown that they’ll ram them down your throat by force.

      Hitler, Stalin, pol pot, Mao Zedong and a slew of others, all had stupid Leftist ideas. They still walk among us.

      10

    • #
      R.B.

      It didn’t stop rising because the GTA three months before was positive. Don’t ask for a physical explanation. There ain’t one.

      00

  • #

    What I would like to know is whether the German government tried to defend against this action. It seems a lot of Western governments actually support these activist and are only too willing to carry out their wishes, which seems to have happened here. I doubt if the court would find in favour of any other action which claimed similar ‘discrimination’ against young people.

    120

    • #
      Ian

      Derek You write

      “What I would like to know is whether the German government tried to defend against this action>”

      I very much doubt it a this report shows

      https://www.pri.org/stories/2019-09-24/germany-politics-climate-change-are-shifting-beneath-merkel-s-feet“

      When German Chancellor Angela Merkel took the stage at Monday’s UN Climate Action Conference, she told the assembled world leaders that industrialized nations bear a special responsibility for having caused climate change, and have a special responsibility to deal with it.

      She stated “Germany sees its responsibility on the national stage and the international stage,”

      But back home in Berlin, the Chancellor is under fire from critics who say her own climate policy is far too timid.

      On Friday, Merkel unveiled a $60 billion package aimed at cutting greenhouse gas emissions and getting Germany on track to meet its commitments under the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement.

      The package includes a new price on carbon emissions. Merkel also announced that Germany would aim for net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.

      Perhaps a few years ago the plan would have been hailed as a major step forward.

      But instead, Merkel’s announcement was met with frustration. Critics called the proposal “faint-hearted,” and disappointing. Even the country’s main industrial federation, which has been skeptical of climate action in the past, noted the plan was “not the huge step it was billed to be.”

      The reception is a sign of a shift underway in Germany, the world’s sixth largest carbon emitter and a key player in international climate negotiations.

      Starting last winter, thousands of students began walking out of school on Fridays as part of youth protests demanding more action on climate change. Then, in May, the Green Party made major gains in the European elections, surging into second place in Germany. Advocates say the politics of global warming are changing rapidly, with more public support for aggressive action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions — and that Merkel’s government isn’t keeping up.

      “If you’re looking to the German debate, what we’re seeing now is a real discrepancy between calls for action, really on a very broad basis … and the government is not delivering,” said Matthias Buck, head of European energy policy at the Berlin-based think tank Agora Energiewende.

      One sign of that shift was the demonstration taking place just blocks away from the chancellor’s press conference, where more than 100,000 people gathered in a massive, festive protest at Berlin’s iconic Brandenburg Gate. It was one of the largest demonstrations in Friday’s worldwide climate strike, led by student

      Merkel herself has acknowledged the importance of that movement. At the press conference announcing her climate package on Friday, she saluted Greta Thunberg, the 16-year-old Swedish teenager who sparked the current student movement. As a trained scientist herself, Merkel said, she’s impressed by Thunberg’s demand that governments “unite behind the science.”

      “We’re not doing something ideological here,” Merkel said, “but something for which there is massive evidence.”

      It seems many Germans are very concerned about climate change a view supported by this report

      https://www.researchgate.net/publication/311486145_Climate_Change_Communication_in_Germany

      40

      • #
        Serp

        It is horrific witnessing the population being stampeded yet again by sloganeering from spurious authority; this decade has begun so poorly that I doubt we’ll have technology enough remaining to register when its end has come.

        31

  • #
    Lance

    If I were German, I’d seriously consider moving to Poland.

    150

    • #
      YallaYPoora Kid

      Er, have you ever been to Germany? Poland is not on their destination wish list.

      10

      • #
        another ian

        Yet

        120

      • #
        Lance

        Yes. Early 80’s, mid 90’s, early 2000’s. But, Germany is morphing into something I don’t really care for.

        At the rate Germany is descending into “wokeness”, Poland may be on their destination list in the near future. I suppose I might ought to have put a /sarc tag on my previous comment.

        All that being said, Western Civilization owes its existence to Polish King Jan III Sobieski who defeated Islam/Ottoman Turks at the Battle of Vienna, 9/11/1683, for which victory Islam has never forgiven the West.

        Some of the finest machinists, mathematicians, and engineers I’ve known were Polish. Except for the intrusions by Russia and Germany, Poland might well have prospered much earlier.

        I do see your point. However, I happen to like kielbasa, pierogi, and Polish Vodka. 🙂

        110

        • #
          OriginalSteve

          Poland has a robust Christian community and faith, and I suspect it could be much preferable to pagan, woke, ruderless Germany….

          40

        • #
          YallaYPoora Kid

          We also were in Germany in the late 80s and early 2010s with a stint in The Netherlands in mid 2000s – each time for 3 years. The change in Europe during this time has been totally disheartening all for the sake of creation of a trading block to combat the USA and later Asia. Cultures have been disseminated by the uncontrolled influx of people seeking a better life outcome – you can’t blame them for that but you can blame the governments for allowing uncontrolled immigration to occur which has created much tension between groups of differing ethnicity. The EU has been a wealth distribution system in line with true socialist ideals and some member countries are threatened if they try to make decisions to suit their own country population rather than the collective whole.
          In my experience Europe is no longer a happy place with all member countries fighting for their piece of the pie (a bit like our States and the Fed government). The big melting pot is just a big mess of socialist ideals which never work.

          Poland at the time was also not one of our personal travel destinations due mostly to influence of local work colleagues at the time (stories of German cars being stolen etc) however we now regret not going there and enjoying their history and culture. We do have friends of Polish origins in Australia. Interestingly we travelled extensively in the former DDR much to the amusement and bewilderment of our friends who were former West Germans.

          20

      • #
        Amr Marzouk

        It was before and that didn’t end well.

        40

      • #
        glen Michel

        Germany takes back Silesia and east Prussia !

        10

  • #

    Not just the young have a right but all have a basic right to shelter. Which shelter protects us from climate change.

    70

    • #
      sophocles

      But we’re going to have be protected from hard radiation when the van Allen Belts come down to ground level. Soon. Nobody has been thinking about that.

      Look up Derinkuyu’s underground city. It was made to cope with the climate problems of the early Holocene.

      20

  • #
    Penguinite

    Thanks Jo! I have posted the essence of this item on Gab 🙂

    According to the BBC (English National – fully publicly funded – Broadcaster like our ABC) Americas most trusted news site (say what?)

    German climate change law violates young peoples rights, court rules?

    It’s time for other (older Tax Paying people) people to sue the court, and their government. All climate change laws are wildly expensive and pointless, and will have no measurable benefit. Expensive electricity will create an unfair debt-burden on the young. It will slow or break the economy, destroy jobs and harm the environment. That’s a violation of their human rights.

    261

  • #
    Zigmaster

    I find it interesting that the countries that have done the most to try to reduce emissions are the ones who have fanatics urging them to do more ( ie Australia, UK, US and EU ( especially Germany) whilst those that do nothing ie China, India, Japan not only don’t get targeted but get praised for their climate action.
    The reason is because they have a chance of being successful because those countries that have already succumbed to their alarmism now have a predisposition that ignores all the bad news, reliability, cost, environmental damage and focus on the benefit, you feel morally good about yourself.
    The key to overcome these bizarre self destructive forces is to reengineer the morality. I actually think it’s time for Mike Moore’s film to be relaunched to make people rethink the virtue of renewables. It’s time to start auditing Weather Bureaus and highlighting the litany of lies and misrepresentations that mainstream media and our education systems present. Sceptics need to infiltrate certain institutions and take back the moral high ground that the alarmists use as a fortress to hide behind as the take out their enemies one by one. The evil of their movement and the hidden agendas need to have the full light of scrutiny shining on them.
    Germany and other western countries caught up in this climate lunacy needs to have governments elected who have the courage to fight back against this insidious movement that is gradually taking full control our lives.

    210

    • #
      John in Oz

      Part of a December 2020 response to me from the Oz PM:

      The Government accepts the findings of our science agencies on climate change. We are
      playing our part and meeting our commitments by helping business and households to adopt
      new, clean technologies – not by applying taxes that hurt jobs and the economy.

      Good luck trying to get some rational heads into the public service when the pollies cannot or will not question what they are being told.

      My latest effort was to send Willis Eschenbach’s (Where’s the Emergency’ post from wattsupwiththat.com to him. Perhaps, in several month’s time, I will get the same form letter telling me that he disagrees with anything other than the CSIRO and tell me how great the future will be with renewables/unreliables.

      60

      • #

        A fair point John, the impossible bind our civilization finds itself in, is that even if the PM agreed with us, he couldn’t put that in writing. Look at what’s happened to Tony Abbott — a million dollars spent on a campaign to oust him from a safe seat and it worked. Look at Craig Kelly. He can’t get any media time now that he’s an independent. The ABC only reported on him while he was useful as a stick to beat the Libs with.

        How many people here who are skeptics are brave enough to raise it at family events and to email friends? Some are, but it’s an effort. So even though poll after poll shows around half the country and even as many as two thirds, do not believe the propaganda, it remains an unspoken thing in most workplaces and many metro social events.

        The media could change this in a week. The problem IS the media. But now that Facebook etc are banning skeptical discussion even there, it’s got worse, not better.

        It’s great that you are sending correspondence to the PM and any pollie. They need that constant reminder, and the more the better. But we have to do something about the media. We must find a way around the clamp.

        220

        • #
          Ian

          ” Look at Craig Kelly. He can’t get any media time now that he’s an independent. The ABC only reported on him while he was useful as a stick to beat the Libs with.”

          The current lack of media interest in Craig Kelly may be because his views are of little or no interest to most Australians hence he is not considered newsworthy.

          “So even though poll after poll shows around half the country and even as many as two thirds, do not believe the
          propaganda, it remains an unspoken thing in most workplaces and many metro social events.”

          The Lowy iInstitute has been monitoring Australians view on climate change since 2006. Their findings certainly do not support your claim.

          https://www.lowyinstitute.org/issues/australia-climate-change

          “The Lowy Institute has surveyed Australians about their views on global warming and climate change for the past fourteen years. Public support for action on climate change was high in the 2006 Lowy Institute Poll, but then fell consistently until 2012. One explanation for this could be political infighting and leadership churn in Australia, as well as a fierce campaign against a ‘carbon tax’. But the impact of severe droughts is another possible factor.

          In a dramatic reversal of attitudes since 2012, however, concern about global warming has been rising steadily over the past six years. In 2019, six in ten Australians (61%) say global warming is ‘a serious and pressing problem’ about which ‘we should begin taking steps now even if this involves significant costs’. The issue of climate change and global warming continues to split Australians along generational lines. A clear majority (76%) of young Australians aged 18-44 agree with this statement, compared to just half (49%) of their elders.

          Below we chart the results of Lowy Institute polling since 2006 on the issue of global warming, accompanied by a timeline of important developments in Australia’s climate policy history.”

          And how on earth can you possibly know that “propaganda” or anything else for that matter, remains unspoken??? It is very difficult to draw any conclusion from silence as it provides no information whatsoever regarding the number of Australians that either believe in or are skeptical of AGW. Perhaps it isn’t discussed because most Australians now believe in AGW and see no reason to discuss the obvious. Who knows?

          113

          • #
            Analitik

            Yeah, that’s why Shorten won the last Federal Election. Oh, hang on….

            130

          • #
            Hanrahan

            The current lack of media interest in Craig Kelly may be because his views are of little or no interest to most Australians hence he is not considered newsworthy.

            Whose job is it to decide what news is fit to print? Censorship by omission is still censorship.

            170

          • #
            Simon B

            Perhaps it isn’t discussed because most Australians now believe in AGW and see no reason to discuss the obvious.
            That happens does it? Everyday of the year humans look outside and discuss the obvious weather, but you think they wouldn’t discuss the climate because it is too obvious?
            People are derisively discussing that the young are being brainwashed into believing localised weather IS climate! Why is there a split on age grounds in surveys? Simply because it’s harder to convince people with experience that up is down!

            10

  • #
    TdeF

    How does something which doesn’t exist violate the rights of those not born? There is no rapid runaway tipping point global warming as alleged in 1988 and we have had 33 years to monitor it. And without it, what is Climate Change? And how does warmer weather hurt anyone? How has an increase of 1.5C in 150 years done anything but good? Or the increase in CO2? Where is the mass extermination promised? Where are the fleeing millions? Climate Change, where are you?

    380

    • #
      el gordo

      The ‘precautionary principle’ is the problem.

      140

      • #
        TdeF

        Agreed, as invented by Sir Paul Nurse in his debate with James Delingpole with his egregious example of the patient who might have cancer. Except there is no “Precautionary Principle”. He made it up to sound pompous and win an argument, a new Isaac Newton, as every subsequent President of the Royal Society must imagine themselves.

        Sir Paul is a Nobel Prize winning geneticist, not a medical doctor. And in the world of human medicine such preemptive action before confirmation of the disease and putting someone’s life in peril for no proven reason but with the best of intentions is completely unethical and would likely have a real medical doctor struck off. And charged with manslaughter if the patient died.

        160

        • #
          TdeF

          And how many will die from the cold and unaffordable electricity and gas to prevent people having to wear shorts in summer?

          190

      • #
        Richard Jenkins

        Precaution is a fancy word for insurancethat was invented by the mafia.
        With AGW the premium cost is like $100,000 dollars a year to insure a $5 watch.

        00

    • #

      Do the unborn have standing? Seems not…

      30

      • #
        Clyde Spencer

        Jo
        Animals, redwoods, and minors are typically provided protections by society because they are incapable of representing themselves in court; nor do they have the ability to vote for legislation. Parents can have standing in court over issues related to their children or soon-to-be children. Parents are assumed to have both the right and responsibility for the care of their offspring, unless the relationship has been severed by the courts.

        10

  • #
    Clyde Spencer

    At least in the USA, one has to establish that they have “standing” to be able to sue. That is, only someone who can demonstrate that they have been harmed can ask the court to redress their injury. Assuming that Germany has similar judicial precepts, then it would seem incumbent on the “young people” to prove that they will actually suffer a future injury, and the solution to preventing that injury would be to reduce carbon dioxide emissions.

    That is exactly what most of us have been asking for. Proof, rather than assertions!

    170

    • #

      Agree Clyde. The burden of proof should be on the global warming activists. They won’t engage in scientific debate with scientists who have ‘inconvenient truths’ or ‘alternative facts’ about climate change. They rightly fear that by so doing it gives the ‘non conformists’ credibility and will stoke further scepticism among voters who have an IQ over 100 (most of us)!

      100

  • #
    TedM

    “Germany’s climate change laws are insufficient and violate fundamental freedoms by putting the burden of curbing CO2 emissions on the young, its highest court has ruled.”

    Is there a single word that means “infinite stupidity”?

    I really want to know.

    120

    • #
      Lance

      Let’s give it a try, shall we?

      Cretinous, Witless.

      “Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I’m not sure about the former.” ~ Albert Einstein

      140

    • #
      Kevin kilty

      Germans like to make bigger words from smaller: unendlichedummheit

      80

    • #
      hillbilly33

      In this instance TedM, what about ‘Anthropogenic’?

      40

    • #
      Flok

      Let us see this young people’s carbon footprint:

      It is the young that need to be chauffeured every day for all reasons
      It is the young that keep their room climate at most comfortable all year
      It is the young that run computers 24/7
      It is the young that demand new toys and clothes and trips to the mall
      It is the young that want pets of all sorts

      When I was young everything stopped in the house by a word NO from the parents.

      Now the PM is their disposal and obviously the court system.

      The upside to this is that these actions will deny them the privileges they are enjoying.

      It is a reflection on parenting skill who most probably grew up in a hippy town.

      That single word could be the consequences.

      30

    • #
      roman

      The rule of law means that orders are made in response to _evidentiary_ breaches of _explicit_ laws. Not by fortune-telling dire consequences on someone’s just-made-up ‘rights’.

      Maybe those French Generals could start their kinetic activism with a detour to the East.

      “kinetic activism”. Ha. I just made that up!

      20

  • #
    Harves

    People with terminal illnesses should sue the country on the basis that they have a right to live and therefore the country should quadruple its expenditure on medical research. Blind people have a right to see, so the country should spend every last dollar on trying to create artificial eyes.

    130

  • #
    Phillip Charles Sweeney

    No leave it to the Germans to destroy their economy

    Germany is a case study in the folly of attempting to “Control the Climate”.

    Earth’s climate has been going through warming and cooling cycles for millions and billions of years.

    Global cooling is a far bigger threat than global warming and that is what is likely to be happening out to around 2050.

    The folly of claiming that burning coal causes global warming will then be exposed.

    190

  • #
    John R Smith

    They are being protected from mean words.
    Why not the weather?

    60

  • #
    Harves

    This is interesting:
    https://wattsupwiththat.com/2021/04/29/denmarks-largest-battery-one-step-closer-to-storing-green-power-in-stones/
    The interesting bit.
    “The only real challenge with establishing 100 per cent renewable electricity supply is that we can’t save the electricity generated during windy and sunny weather for use at a later time. Demand and production do not follow the same pattern. There are not yet commercial solutions to this problem, but we hope to be able to deliver this with our GridScale energy storage system,” says Henrik Stiesdal, founder of the climate technology company Stiesdal Storage Technologies, which is behind the technology.”
    So a pro-renewables study is clearly stating that commercial solutions DO NOT CURRENTLY EXIST. Meanwhile the leftist media continue to push propaganda about how renewables are ready to replace fossil fuels. Laughable.

    190

    • #
      sophocles

      Will their solutions work for long periods of extreme cold?

      Dry cell batteries won’t work at all when temps fall to 4 ° C and less. That’s why I keep all my spare batteries in the bottom of my frig… I’m not so sure about wet cells but I can see anything relying on ion transfer having problems.

      (I’m still using up a block of AAAs I put in the bottom of my frig 10 YA.)

      20

  • #
    John in Oz

    I wonder what other laws and government policies the courts will rule against as being unfair to future generations?

    40

    • #
      Harves

      Policies that allow current generations to buy property are unfair to future generations because these properties might not then be available for future generations.

      20

  • #
    TdeF

    And it is another example of judges trying to write the law. We have had this with the US Supreme Court ruling on the multi billion dollar abortion industry and overriding the States and in the UK with Tony Blair’s new Supreme Court which presumed to set aside Boris Johnson’s law on BREXIT. It is not their job and is outside their power and purpose. But the elites hate a parliament which represents the people and not rich businessmen and these judges are part of the elite system which presumes to know better. Like Malcolm Turnbull.

    In Australia and the UK, Judges are not elected. They do not represent the people’s wishes and are supposed to impartially interpret the laws, except that they are appointed by politicians which does prejudice the system. And parliaments write laws, although judges can make decisions which become law and set precedents.

    But in this case German judges are directly attacking a law because they personally disagree and in matters of science they do not understand. The laws of science are not the laws of the land. That is a step too far. The job of judges is to interpret the legislation unless and only in the highest court, the legislated laws can be argued to violate the very Constitution.

    In Australia I believe the RET scheme to be utterly illegal and against every precedent since Magna Carta. It is fundamentally wrong for parliament to force the people to enrich third parties though a massive hidden levy on their electricity purchases which additional money charged and passed directly and only to the owners of windmills and solar panels, friends of the government. Governments can only raise taxes and impose fines. This enriching of investors, even overseas investors bypasses parliament and the Treasury so the $6Billion Carbon Tax is not literally a tax but legislated and hidden theft.

    Similarly the new device announced this week to force ‘retailers’ to ensure reliable power will translate into yet another massive tax on the people, enforced in your electricity bills which will now presumably subsidize fossil fuel suppliers so that adequate power is available. So one law passes your cash directly to windmill and solar panel people above and beyond what they are paid for the power. And the other will now pass subsidy cash to fossil fuel suppliers to make sure they are ready to fill the predictable reliability gap created by the first law.

    All this is illegal, undemocratic and theft, legislated by parliament. And the UK has copied this evil system. And in Australia it allowed Canberra to take over what used to be cheap state based coal and gas power systems and play games.

    Incidentally this also enriches a new army of public servants who presume to know what is good for us. Clean energy departments. Clean energy finance. The list is endless. So what’s dirty? Carbon dioxide?

    Judges should not have a say in science. There is no Climate Crisis. Carbon Dioxide is essential for all life. And more is better. Plus the ridiculous and completely unproven idea that we humans control the levels of gas in the atmosphere. I would love to hear a judges opinion on Newton’s Third Law of Motion.

    It’s arrogant, presumptive judges who are out of control and acting illegally. In Victoria the judges who put Cardinal George Pell in jail without any evidence at all.

    200

    • #
      TdeF

      The big change in electricity as recommended by the AEMO is laid out here. Once legisltated we the public will ultimately have to subsidize through direct theft of cash from our electricity bills both the windmill/solar panel owners AND subsidize the coal and gas providers on standby.

      This is a case of bureaucrats like judges making the decision that the public can afford their Green dreams of a future which makes no sense scientifically or economically and make electricity unaffordable to the poor who otherwise pay no tax.

      (Man made) Climate Change is crap. It does not exist. Can we please go back to the 1970s where judges and politicians respected the needs of the people and not those of an extremist Green minority and proceed to plunder our wages and savings to support their fantasies? Like Turnbull’s pumping water uphill ($12Billion) when we already know it makes no economic sense and will never be used.

      140

      • #
        sophocles

        Man made) Climate Change is crap. It does not exist.

        Couldn’t agree with you more.

        We’re soon going to have our noses rubbed in it, too.
        I can wait …

        70

        • #
          TdeF

          From memory, I am quoting our former Prime Minister Tony Abbott. He was removed unjustly by the enemies of the Liberal party, merchant banker Malcolm Turnbull and his Black Hand, all gone now.

          80

    • #
      Harves

      Incidentally this also enriches a new army of public servants who presume to know what is good for us. Clean energy departments. Clean energy finance. The list is endless. So what’s dirty? Carbon dioxide?

      This is a key part of the socialist agenda. Once more than 50% of the population depends on the Govt for their livelihood the party driving bigger Govt will always win.

      100

    • #
      Kalm Keith

      Yes.

      20

  • #
    Richard Jenkins

    Surely the courts obligation is to have proof that the GW theory re man’s influence is serious has to be investigated.
    That requires scientists from both sides to give evidence. Both sides proves the science isn’t settled.
    Two basic questions.

    When was the average year? and
    When didn’t climate change in all time and or since Christ AD?

    80

    • #
      TdeF

      The question is not whether the climate changes. Or whether the planet is warming or cooling. Or whether Carbon Dioxide is going up or down. Or whether it has any significant effect on temperature. All that matters is whether we control CO2 levels. The fact is human contribution to CO2 is 4%. And that is costing $1.5Trillion a year, a gigantic industry which self justifies. There is no crisis. There is not even any warming. Or if there is, there is nothing we can do to change it. Science is not settled by courts. It is settled only by facts.

      180

  • #
    Gerry

    So how long before the extreme rebellion people in Australia start a court action? Or is that too “unradical” for them ?

    20

  • #
    Phillip Charles Sweeney

    To claim that man-made CO2 emissions cause global warming is a classic example of Goebbels’ “Big Lie”

    “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”

    70

    • #
      sophocles

      At least it means they (the Greens) don’t have a fallback when the global freezing cuts in.

      30

      • #
        Gary Simpson

        I’m afraid they will then take the credit for the cooling, claiming their policies worked and thus were completely justified. Checkmate. Sad but true.

        40

        • #
          sophocles

          I didn’t say cooling. I said “Freezing.”

          Download and read: https://pastebin.com/TXf4wXCP

          Pay attention to “Millions of animals froze to death.”

          20

          • #
            DOC

            I wish I could be around as the temperature falls and the true believers start demanding the world pours CO2 into the atmosphere as the oceans suck it up with temperatures falling, because they believe they control the earth’s climate and decide they’ve simply gone too far by dropping it. Imagine reversing the anti fossil fuel demands.

            10

  • #
    Kalm Keith

    Germany needs a clean out of its court system.

    Has the court checked on the provisions made for the removal of “spent” wind turbines like those pictured above?

    Running or retired, I suspect that those turbines will be there as a dangerous eyesore for eternity.

    Bah!

    120

    • #
      Flok

      I heard that in Germany people don’t swear, because apparently everything works.

      I see tide is turning

      30

  • #
    Speedy

    Every time you hear about some international climate deal, think of that line from the musical “Camelot”.

    “And there’s a legal limit to the snow here – in Camelot…”

    Altogether now…

    Cheers,

    Speedy

    90

  • #
    Amr Marzouk

    Meanwhile from Poerline Site

    The Name is Green, James Green:

    This story from the Telegraph evidently is not a parody. Britain’s spy agency promises to focus on sniffing out other countries’ carbon dioxide emissions:

    MI6 is placing the climate emergency at the forefront of its international espionage with “green spying” on the world’s big polluters, its new chief has revealed.

    Richard Moore, head of the UK’s foreign intelligence service, described climate change as the “foremost international foreign policy item for this country and for the planet”.

    It means the big industrial countries will be monitored by MI6 to ensure they are upholding their commitments to combating rising global temperatures.

    After all these years, Moore is the first head of MI6 to be interviewed on broadcast media. And what does he talk about? Global warming.

    China will be the agency’s #1 target. Will MI6 focus on China’s rapidly growing navy? Its threats against Taiwan? Mass incarceration and murder of the Uighurs? Nope.

    He indicated that British spies will make China the focus of much of their climate-related espionage by pointing out that Beijing is “certainly the largest emitter” of carbon.

    “Our job is to shine a light in places where people might not want it shone and so clearly we are going to support what is the foremost international foreign policy agenda item for this country and for the planet, which is around the climate emergency, and of course we have a role in that space,” he told Times Radio.

    We can only hope that this is disinformation, but sadly, I suspect it is for real. And I doubt that our own intelligence agencies are much more serious.

    Amr Marzouk

    80

  • #
    Peter Qualey

    Yep, the foregoing pretty much says it all.
    With electricity too expensive to charge their
    cars life will be rather trying.
    And then again with no wind or sun, they
    couldn’t anyway, so back to horse and buggy
    and gas lamps or candles

    What did socialists use before candles?

    – electricity

    80

  • #

    The case makes no sense, even from an AGW perspective. These kids should sue the Chinese and Indian governments – if they are serious. Of course they aren’t, though.

    50

    • #
      sophocles

      I’m already imagining the legal suits when this Geomagnetic Excursion which is winding up, really gets going.
      I can’t say it’s going to be a gas, but it should be … umm … interesting.

      The courts may have to order us to use petrol/diesel vehicles to warm the atmosphere!

      70

      • #
        el gordo

        In a court of law we could argue that the geomagnetic excursion has a cyclic nature. Does it happen on a regular basis and is the barycentre involved?

        30

        • #
          Richard Owen No.3

          el g:

          I can see the demos now…..idi*ts dressed in red robes calling “Ban the barycentre now!”

          30

        • #
          sophocles

          el gordo:
          In the last few days, you mentioned that you wanted to revise your thinking about the Younger Dryas.

          Found this among my “archives,” which you should find very interesting:
          https://pastebin.com/TXf4wXCP

          Pay particular attention to the words “Millions of animals were frozen alive”

          Frozen. That’s not just a ‘bit of cooling.’

          (Lines 194 – 279 ). While you’re at it, you could read the whole thing. 😀

          30

        • #
          sophocles

          … about 12,000 years give and take a bit.

          20

          • #
            sophocles

            … for the cycle.

            20

            • #
              el gordo

              The geomagnetic excursions are caused by external forcing, yet to be determined.

              https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/geomagnetic-excursions-interglacial-termination-abrupt-climate-change.384098/

              The other interesting point is that the forcing has limited impact during glaciation and obviously more severe at a time when the planet is enjoying interglacial conditions. So the idea that an asteroid impact caused the Younger Dryas is probably untrue.

              10

              • #
                Graeme#4

                That was a very interesting link EG. Thanks. The physics folk’s concern seemed to be that there was a possibility of geomagnetic changes occurring right now that could upset earth’s delicate climate balance.

                10

              • #
                sophocles

                Thank you.

                Morner is very careful so I’m a bit surprised at the question mark but the sediment was only one and seems it wasn’t a convincing case. (Sediments are very difficult to date reliably and that may be the case also for Lake Mungo.)

                The younger Dryas also got lumps to aid and abet its catastrophe. Much of the explanation(s) are in Graham Hancock’s book Magicians of the Gods. I can strongly recommend it.

                The lumps are comet fragments playing their part (or parts) as incoming high velocity meteors. Check the Comet Research Group. Lumps of Ice sheet went into space and fell back to thoroughly chill North America.

                Graham Hancock (https://grahamhancock.com/) has left rich pickings on line including some podcasts with Randall Carlson (randallcarlson.com) on Joe Rogan’s podcast. Those were also extremely interesting. They may not be scientists but neither are they blinkered.

                00

              • #
              • #
                sophocles

                That reminds me: came across a video (Youtube) which is relevant: “Catastrophe Episode 5 Survival Earth.” About 33 minutes in to almost the end. How a comet piece can hit an ice-covered landscape where the ice absorbs the impact. No crater left.

                10

  • #
    Ruairi

    It’s time that Germany’s youth,
    Being misled and young in the tooth,
    Realize that they feed,
    On more CO2 need,
    Which for plants in the food chain is truth.

    100

  • #
    SimonB

    I can’t put it any better than author, Matt Ridley in his book The Rational Optimist, when he says that the history of mankind and innovation informs us that we pay a higher price trying to fix the future than applying our technology to todays issues.
    Attempting to brainwash the children of today that mans small part in climate change is an emergency likely to lead to a 2030 apocalypse and we are therefore aberrant if we don’t spend billions to future proof their world short changes their ability to invent and innovate and problem solve.
    The current ’emergency’ brainwashing is purely creating a call to action to fast track the payback on renewables investors. We’ll see an increase in this type of circumvention of voter rights as the WEF seminar approaches to ‘soften the blow’ of their consensus that we must urgently move power to their hands as we are recalcitrant uneducated children unworthy of voting rights and material ownership.

    60

    • #
      Kalm Keith

      “we must urgently move power to their hands as we are recalcitrant uneducated children unworthy of voting rights and material ownership.”

      A good summary.

      How did it get so far?

      50

      • #
        Simon B

        It was always there. Now they have tech oligarchs (with slavish devotees) as adherents to their utopian mantras, they can silence any counter view, portray history thru their own lens and censor facts to fit their claims of emergencies.

        We’re talking about propaganda to useful idiots who see a soundbite, tweet or bait headline and believe that is the truth, because these are mega rich role models, not brainwashing villains from a Netflix show! So I’ve been informed in 200 characters with careful wording; as we know, etc, then I can go back to the selfie of me raking my fingers thru my hair with a pristine beach on Mykinos or St Lucia in the background. Then it’s filtered down a layer to an impressionable teen audience who aspire to the vacuous life of a freeloading influencer as this lifestyle won’t be here for you if this beach disappears due to rising sea levels.
        The whole thing is based on the hierarchical template going back to chieftains & mystics who held the power in the village and the only way to improve your lot was to appeal to them for favours. Of course the powerful believe the villagers to be gullible useful idiots, who aren’t actually improving their wealth and status, but strengthening the leadership of the power bloc. Every now and then there’s fringe useful idiots like Antifa and Extinction Rebellion to throw the spotlight on to galvanise the villagers that they are lunatics and we are moderate.
        I mean come on, they’re burning suburbs and gluing themselves to roads, while we are doing great, far reaching things here in a civilised way. We’re fixing the ecology and humanity with tangible processes through climate emergency and critical race theory and cancel culture is a vital tool to this moderate response, while ER lay in intersections howling at the moon!
        It’s always been there Keith, just this century it isn’t Northern Europe or Eastern Asia. The global communications advance has increased the ambitions of Klaus Schwab and his dangerous cabal and they have a powerful propaganda machine to advance their subjugation of the western masses.
        The WEF has powerful bureaucracy at their beck and call with UN and EU flunkies ready to do their bidding.
        Just remember Keith, YOU will own nothing and be happy. Mind you that ownership will multiply exponentially for Klaus, Zuckerberg, Dorsey, Gore, Blood and the dozens of useful sycophants who have done their bidding and been rewarded with insider tips as to which renewables to invest in.

        10

  • #
    DOC

    This should make governments of Western democracies wake up to the legal traps they have now set for themselves and their nations, all due to the fact their egos had them thinking they would determine the science of climate, at a time that science was at a very early stage of development. They had no independent views on how the UN functioned and like babies ignored any propensity for the UN to develop proclammations based on politics and ideologies of activists whose megalomania had them believing the UN was a ready-made organisation that could run the world.

    At such an early stage our politicians knew so little about anything, thought they knew everything, declared science was ‘in’ and have actively led their nations into the climate trap – even when the UN had the template of the wealth redistribution’s that lay at the root of the theory, on-line for anyone to read (which I did). This led to the labelling and accosting of those who were warning them to look at the alternative science based knowledge which didn’t justify the position they were forcing on their nations. Instead of refuting such argument our politicians excoriated the ‘take a moment to look’ people, labelling them as sceptics. The submarine and defence debacle, born of complacency and destroyed by current timing and expectations , is simply a cheaper disaster to that coming from the climate argument now pushed further to the extremes by laws to force that position.

    Where one Court goes you can expect Courts in other Democracies of recent times to follow. The US Elections show us what other forces will be brought to bear eg the institutions of the woke, the government and the billionaires leading social media. The Democracies are now in a total mess, economically, scientifically, socially and unity is fracturing.

    40

    • #
      Simon B

      Too true, unity is fracturing, but with everything else in the West the propaganda machine reverses the narrative. Biden is portraying his administration as the voice of reason and unity. You can’t criticise that! You’re a heretic! You’re a road block to vital change!
      Admitting your privilege is vital to a unified world. You must highlight the differences in cultures, race and creed and apologize for them to ensure those differences are always front and centre in a unified world! How can you possibly disagree with that?
      I saw a piece from Australian cultural videographer Avi Yemeni the other day, where a leftwing activist told him he should just kill himself as everything he stands for is disgusting. Avi asked him what part of his beliefs this activist despised and this guy actually said,’ I dunno, I’ve never watched any of your stuff and never will, but I’m told you are a neo fascist and your mother should be ashamed of you!’
      So DOC, unity is a loose term used for advantage. Like radical religious zealots, the left isn’t trying to change the views of those who question them, they just want them erased so the New World Order of groupthink doesn’t have a fringe element of dissidents picking away at their facade of unity.
      Of course history suggests they’ll create it themselves by their arrogance and hubris. One tenet holds true through all this; there’s no tolerance in the tolerance movement!

      20

  • #
    David Wojick

    Irrationality taken to its logical extreme. Fascinating! (I do not live there.)

    20

  • #
    CHRIS

    This ‘mess’ will continue, until the myth of CAGW is completely destroyed. Unfortunately, because of the ignorance of the Scientific Method by the masses (and thus their brainwashing by the Soros/Gore/Musks etc of this world)), this will take some time.

    30

  • #
    Steve of Cornubia

    I’m afraid that the Left is far more effective at engaging with and ‘informing’ young and ill-informed minds than the Right. We know how this is done, with Leftist-influenced indoctrination having hijacked/infected curriculum from kindergarten all the way through to our universities. We also know that naive young people, not yet exposed to or affected by actual facts of life are inevitably drawn toward the side of politics that simply promotes a policy of ‘out with the old, in with the new’ as if it’s the answer to everything. The MSM meanwhile, projects a similarly-simplistic message designed to aggravate those who feel less ‘privileged’.

    Until conservatives truly acknowledge and deal with this fact, they will continue to lose. They might huff and puff, wag fingers and engage in trivial and futile (the courts are already stacked) legal actions, but the Left keeps on gaining ground.

    10

  • #
    Forrest Gardener

    The acronym FUBAR seems apt to describe judiciaries the world over. And legislatures and executive governments. And I for one cannot think of any effective measure I can take.

    10

  • #

    […] Court rules Germany needs *more carbon action*. Who cares what voters think? Young people have right… […]

    00