It is now a familiar picture: Shell versus Milieudefensie in court. Today there was an exceptional hearing at the Supreme Court, the highest court in the Netherlands. Procedures here are often in writing, but this time the parties were able to have their arguments heard.

Milieudefensie’s lawyers repeated the well-known position: “Shell must reduce emissions very significantly”. Counsel Roger Cox emphasized the responsibility that Shell and other companies have to reduce CO2.

A commitment by Shell to significantly reduce emissions “will make an important and major contribution to combating climate change,” Cox said in the audience in The Hague.

Lawyers for Shell started their argument with the statement that the parties agree that an “urgent transformation in the energy system is needed”. Lawyer Freerk Vermeulen also acknowledges “that companies like Shell have a role in this”. But then the opinions of Milieudefensie and Shell diverge, he continues.

Shell points out that worldwide demand for oil and gas is still growing. “And oil and gas will continue to play an important role in meeting energy demand for a considerable time to come.”

It is a protracted legal battle that has lasted for seven years. In 2021, the judge ruled that Shell had to accelerate its reduction of CO2 emissions.

Three years later, that ruling was overturned on appeal. The court ruled that although Shell must reduce emissions, it also makes no sense to have the company do more than other energy producers. The demand to reduce Shell’s emissions by 45 percent by 2030 was therefore rejected.

Milieudefensie, then still under director Donald Pols, went to the Supreme Court. The fact that the court cannot indeed impose a specific percentage of emission reduction on an individual company is something for the highest court to decide, Milieudefensie found.

That is why the two parties met today in The Hague.

The central question today: can the court order Shell to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by a certain percentage? Shell finds this “not only of little use, but also disproportionate”. Milieudefensie calls it necessary.

The pleas led to critical questions from the judges and members of the public prosecutor’s office. They wanted to know how Milieudefensie arrived at this specific percentage of 45 percent reduction.

Milieudefensie pointed to climate scenarios that show what reduction in CO2 is necessary. The counselor said that this already shows an absolute lower limit of 30 percent and other factors have not yet been taken into account.

Whether the Supreme Court follows this will become clear early next year. The public prosecutor’s office will make a compelling recommendation to the Supreme Court in the autumn. The ruling is expected to follow in the spring of 2027.

In the meantime, Milieudefensie has filed a new case against Shell. In it, the environmental organization states that the company must stop tapping new oil and gas wells.