Belgian farmer takes TotalEnergies to court, seeking climate damages

A Belgian farmer is taking French oil and gas company TotalEnergies to court, seeking compensation for damage to his farm linked to climate change and a legal order for the company to halt investment in new fossil fuel projects.

A Belgian farmer is taking French oil and gas company TotalEnergies to court, seeking compensation for damage to his farm linked to climate change and a legal order for the company to halt investment in new fossil fuel projects. The case, filed on Wednesday at the Tournai commercial court, is the first climate change-related lawsuit in Belgium to target a multinational company. It follows a case in which thousands of citizens successfully sued the Belgian government to demand stronger greenhouse-gas emission cuts.

Hugues Falys, who farms cattle in the municipality of Lessines, is seeking to force TotalEnergies to overhaul its business plan - including immediately halting investment in new fossil fuel projects and reducing its oil and gas production each by 47% by 2030. He also seeks damages, which, if awarded, he will donate to a sustainable farming organisation.

TotalEnergies said in a statement the company had not received official notification of the summons, and therefore would not comment on the case. "TotalEnergies regrets the litigation process undertaken: the issue of climate change and the energy transition is not the legal responsibility of a given actor but rather the collective effort of the whole of society," the statement said, adding that the company's transition strategy was centred around emissions-free electricity sources and gas.

The case is part of a swelling tide of climate litigation, with 2,180 climate-related court cases filed as of the end of 2022, amid the worsening impacts of global warming from dangerous heatwaves to shrinking water resources. The Belgian case is unusual, however, for attempting to hold a fossil fuel company accountable for climate damage in a country other than where the company is based. TotalEnergies is headquartered in Paris, France.

'DEPENDENT ON CLIMATE' Falys and the three NGOs bringing the case argue that, as one of the world's top 20 CO2-emitting companies, TotalEnergies is partly responsible for damage to his operations from extreme weather in the years 2016-2022.

During that period, an extreme storm and successive droughts reduced his crop and meadow yields, forcing him to buy animal feed and eventually to reduce the size of his herd. "We are an activity completely dependent on the climate," Falys told Reuters.

He argues TotalEnergies failed to comply with Belgian law, which states that anyone who causes damage must make reparations for it. "This case reinforces the message that major polluters have duties and face liability wherever they do business, direct their products, and cause harm," said Nikki Reisch, a director at the Centre for International Environmental Law.

In a similar major climate case, Peruvian farmer Saul Luciano Lliuya argues German utility RWE's emissions have contributed to the melting of Andean glaciers. That case is proceeding through the courts. Matthias Petel from the League of Human Rights, one of the campaign groups bringing the Belgian case, said the suit aimed to create legal avenues that could be repeated against other large-emitting companies.

"The legal standards that we using are very much replicable," Petel said.

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