So far, the dispute over the state government’s climate protection policy has only been fought in the state parliament and on other political stages. Now he is being fought in court for the first time. This Thursday, the Bavarian Administrative Court (VGH) is hearing about the climate lawsuit brought by the German Environmental Aid (DUH) against the Free State of Bavaria. It’s a big day for the DUH. “With our lawsuit, we want to force the state government and state parliament to finally adopt a climate protection program that deserves its name,” says DUH Managing Director Jürgen Resch. “What you have presented so far is just a random list of individual measures, with no real claim that Bavaria can use them to meet its own climate goals, those of the federal government or the 1.5-degree goal of the Paris climate protection agreement.”
With its lawsuit, the DUH joins the long line of parties, associations and experts who do not keep Bavarian climate protection policy a good hair. Because it’s not just the opposition in the state parliament and environmental organizations, whose core business includes criticism of the state government, who have accused the black-orange coalition of complete failure in climate protection. But also numerous organizations and experts who are above any partisan suspicion – from the energy sector, industry and business in general, but also from the municipalities, universities, all kinds of research institutes and the like. This has been made clear by the many written declarations on the new Bavarian climate protection law, but also by the oral statements made in the parliamentary hearing.
The head of the state parliament Greens, Ludwig Hartmann, calls the DUH lawsuit “a cry for help against the ignorance of Prime Minister Markus Söder when it comes to leaving our children and grandchildren a world worth living in”. And from the point of view of SPD leader Florian von Brunn, it is overdue that the state government is finally committed to effective climate protection measures. He would therefore be “very happy” about a corresponding verdict from the VGH.
The lawsuit by the DUH itself dates from the summer of 2021. At that time, the Federal Constitutional Court had just quashed large parts of the federal climate protection law by resolution. The reason: The Karlsruhe judges found it too non-binding and not detailed enough – both in terms of the goals and the individual climate protection measures. At the time, Prime Minister Markus Söder (CSU) was one of the first to recognize that the decision would have consequences for Bavarian climate protection policy and promptly announced that the Bavarian climate protection law, which was only a few months old at the time, would be revised and a climate protection program worth many millions of euros would be formulated.
“Pure declarations of intent”
The DUH didn’t want to wait until both were finished. As in other federal states, she quickly filed a lawsuit against the climate protection policy in Bavaria. And she feels empowered these days. From her point of view, the tightening of the requirements in Bavaria – the Free State should now be climate-neutral by 2040 instead of the previous 2050 – and the 150 individual measures in the Free State’s climate action program are again just “pure declarations of intent, of which no one can say that they bring about real climate protection “, as DUH Managing Director Resch says. “This is paper pollution! That has to change fundamentally now.”
In the state government, they might see things differently. Shortly after the lawsuit became known a year and a half ago, the head of the state chancellery, Florian Herrmann (CSU), stated that he was firmly assuming that the lawsuit by the DUH would sort itself out as a result of the new Bavarian climate protection law. Accordingly, one can learn these days at the VGH that the state government will represent the conviction in the hearing that the DUH “already lacks the authority to bring such a claim”. Observers assume that on Thursday it will first of all be about complicated procedural issues. A decision is expected at a later date.