Climate litigation has expanded from a relatively concentrated practice into a global field involving governments, companies, communities and financial institutions. The tracked database contained 2,967 climate cases filed from 1986 through the end of 2024, including at least 226 new cases in 2024. These figures come primarily from the Sabin Center Climate Change Litigation Databases as analyzed in the LSE/Grantham Institute’s Global trends in climate change litigation: 2025 snapshot.
Contents
- Global volume and filing trends
- Geographic distribution and regional participation
- Climate litigation in apex courts
- Government, corporate and polluter-pays cases
- Adaptation, projects and financial systems
- Outcomes, corporate exposure and climate washing
Global volume and filing trends
The long-run trend is upward. Annual global climate-case filings rose from around 120 in 2015 to more than 300 in 2021. In the 2025 snapshot, at least 226 new cases were filed globally during 2024. The United States accounted for 164 of those filings, while 62 were recorded outside the United States. The same 2024 group included 187 cases classified as strategic litigation and 60 involving arguments classified as not aligned with climate goals. These classifications describe how the source report categorized cases; they do not mean every case had the same legal objective or outcome. LSE/Grantham Institute, Global trends in climate change litigation: 2025 snapshot
The total count should be read alongside the source’s changing snapshots. The 2024 snapshot dataset contained 2,666 cases when its trend analysis closed at the end of 2023, and about 70% of those cases had been filed since 2015. That report also included 43 cases filed in 2024, but its trend analysis ended in 2023. The 2025 snapshot focuses on calendar-year 2024. Counts are therefore database-dependent and may lag later identification of cases. LSE/Grantham Institute, Global trends in climate change litigation: 2024 snapshot; LSE/Grantham Institute, Global trends in climate change litigation: 2025 snapshot
| Measure | Figure | Period |
|---|---|---|
| Climate cases tracked globally | 2,967 | 1986–2024 |
| New global cases | At least 226 | 2024 |
| US cases among 2024 filings | 164 | 2024 |
| Cases outside the US among 2024 filings | 62 | 2024 |
| Strategic cases among 2024 filings | 187 | 2024 |
The counts are not a forecast of future litigation. They are observed filings in a defined database, using a definition that covers cases before judicial or quasi-judicial bodies involving material climate science, policy or law.
Geographic distribution and regional participation
By the end of 2024, climate cases had been identified in nearly 60 countries. Costa Rica was recorded as one new country joining the map in 2024. The United States remained the largest national jurisdiction in the tracked data, with 1,899 recorded cases by the end of 2024. Australia followed with 164 recorded cases. These national totals cover the full tracked period, not only new filings in 2024. LSE/Grantham Institute, Global trends in climate change litigation: 2025 snapshot
The Global South represented more than 260 tracked cases by the end of 2024, or around 9% of the global total. Almost 60% of recorded Global South cases were filed between 2020 and 2024, indicating that participation in the source’s Global South category is relatively recent within the historical dataset. The report’s geographic categories are its own Global South and Global North classifications and should not be treated as interchangeable with every possible regional definition.
The role of public authorities also differed sharply across these categories. Government bodies initiated 56% of Global South climate cases in 2024, compared with 5% of Global North climate cases. This comparison concerns the share of 2024 cases initiated by government bodies, not the share of all cases accumulated over the full period. LSE/Grantham Institute, Global trends in climate change litigation: 2025 snapshot
The global totals also leave room for important undercounting. Chinese courts handled more than 500 climate-related cases involving carbon markets, energy-transition contracts or carbon sinks that were not yet included in the global databases through 2024. This is a reminder that database coverage and the report’s climate-litigation definition shape the numbers. The more than 500 Chinese cases are not added to the 2,967-case global total.
Climate litigation in apex courts
Apex courts provide a narrower view of litigation with potentially broad legal significance. The 2025 snapshot identified 276 climate cases reaching apex courts globally between 2015 and the end of 2024. The United States accounted for 117 of them: 74 were heard by state supreme courts and 43 by the US Supreme Court. LSE/Grantham Institute, Global trends in climate change litigation: 2025 snapshot
Several other countries also recorded substantial apex-court activity during the same period:
- Brazil: 19 cases reaching an apex court.
- Germany: 15 cases.
- Colombia: 13 cases.
- Canada: 10 cases.
- Mexico: 10 cases.
Austria had six known climate lawsuits filed directly at its apex court between 2015 and the end of 2024. “Reaching an apex court” and “filed directly” are different measures: the first describes cases that came before the court, while the second describes the filing route reported for Austria.
Among 250 apex-court climate cases with outcomes, 49% were classified as enhancing climate action, 40% as hindering climate action and 11% as neutral. These percentages apply only to cases with outcomes in the apex-court sample, not to all 276 cases and not to all climate cases in the database. LSE/Grantham Institute, Global trends in climate change litigation: 2025 snapshot
Government, corporate and polluter-pays cases
Corporate-framework litigation asks courts to address companies’ broader climate governance, transition planning or emissions responsibilities. Four new corporate-framework cases were filed in 2024. Twenty-three such cases had been filed since 2015, all outside the United States. At least 20 corporate-framework cases seeking Scope 3 emissions reductions had been filed globally through 2024. Scope 3 refers here to emissions in a company’s wider value chain, as characterized by the source report. LSE/Grantham Institute, Global trends in climate change litigation: 2025 snapshot
Polluter-pays litigation is a separate stream focused on monetary damages. Eleven new polluter-pays cases seeking damages were filed in 2024, bringing the number filed since 2015 to 85. Of those 85 cases, 36 concerned responsibility for defendants’ global emissions and 49 concerned localized climate-damage claims. The localized cases included 39 in Brazil, nine in Indonesia and one in China. The categories describe the claims tracked in the report and are not a statement that damages were awarded.
Climate-washing cases address alleged gaps between climate-related claims and conduct or evidence. Twenty-five climate-washing cases were identified as filed in 2024, compared with 53 in 2023. The year-to-year figures count identified filings and do not by themselves establish whether the underlying claim succeeded. LSE/Grantham Institute, Global trends in climate change litigation: 2025 snapshot
Adaptation, projects and financial systems
Failure-to-adapt cases focus on alleged shortcomings in preparing for climate impacts. Seven were filed in 2024, while 80 had been filed since 2015. Just under 30% of decided failure-to-adapt cases had succeeded before the courts through 2024. The success figure covers decided cases, so it should not be applied to all 80 filings.
Transition-risk litigation was much smaller in the 2024 filing count: one transition-risk case was filed, in South Korea. In a different but related category, seven turning-off-the-taps cases targeting financial flows were filed in 2024, and more than 40 had been filed from 2015 through 2024. These counts distinguish litigation directed at financial flows from the larger universe of climate cases.
Project approvals can also generate litigation about emissions outside a project’s immediate site. Four additional UK fossil-fuel projects faced legal challenges centered on failure to assess Scope 3 emissions after the Finch litigation, during 2024–2025. This is a reported case-development count for that period, not a forecast of future UK litigation. LSE/Grantham Institute, Global trends in climate change litigation: 2025 snapshot
Outcomes, corporate exposure and climate washing
Litigation can affect companies through legal outcomes and through market expectations. A firm-value study examined 108 climate lawsuits against US- and European-listed firms between 2005 and 2021. Across the study’s specified sample, firms experienced an average 0.41% fall in stock returns after a climate-related filing or unfavorable court decision. These are study estimates for the listed-firm sample, not measurements for every company or every climate case. LSE/Grantham Institute, Impacts of climate litigation on firm value
The effect was larger for Carbon Major firms in the study. Their stock returns fell by 0.57% after climate-litigation filings and by 1.50% after unfavorable climate-litigation decisions. The distinction matters: a filing and an unfavorable decision are separate events, and the figures should not be combined into a single loss estimate.
The climate-washing record also shows a notable claimant-success rate among cases with official decisions. A review identified 120 cases filed between 2016 and 2023. Of the 60 climate-washing cases with official decisions, 42 concluded in favor of the claimant. Germany recorded 13 successful climate-washing outcomes and the United Kingdom recorded 11. The 42-case figure applies only to the 60 cases with official decisions, not to all 120 filings. [LSE/Grantham Institute, Climate-washing litigation: towards greater corporate accountability?
Taken together, these statistics show a field operating across several legal pathways: public-law challenges, corporate governance claims, damages actions, adaptation disputes, project approvals and financial flows. The totals remain dependent on database coverage, case definitions and measurement periods, while the market figures are estimates for a specified sample of listed firms rather than universal effects.