Scientists say such source attribution could help power litigation aimed at holding the fossil fuel industry accountable for damages from he
Excerpt from this story from Inside Climate News:
Carbon emissions generated by the world’s 180 largest fossil fuel and cement producers have played a substantial role in driving dangerous and oftentimes deadly extreme heat events around the world, according to new research.
A study published Wednesday in the journal Nature finds that these emissions from the so-called carbon majors contributed to about half of the increase in intensity of heat waves compared to the preindustrial era. They have also contributed to significant increases in the likelihood of extreme heat events, including some that would have been virtually impossible without climate change.
Led by researchers at the university ETH Zurich in Switzerland, the study examined the influence of climate change on over 200 heat waves around the globe from 2000 to 2023. It also looked at how the carbon majors contributed to these heat waves, finding that they played a significant role in their occurrence.
The latter analysis involves what is known as source attribution. In climate research, that means attributing global warming and its impacts to specific emissions sources. Researchers calculate the carbon emissions attributable to the carbon majors using data on company operations and sold products and associated emissions factors for carbon dioxide and methane. Those emissions figures are then used in climate models (comparing scenarios with and without observed warming) to analyze how the emitting companies contributed to increased warming.
Scientists are also able to pinpoint the influence of human-caused climate change on specific extreme weather events. This study combines those two approaches. It is one of the first to systematically analyze the impact that emissions from specific companies have had on multiple extreme weather events, in this case extreme heat, over a particular time period.
Researchers say their results are especially relevant for informing climate accountability initiatives such as litigation and that the study helps fill an evidentiary gap that may assist in establishing legal responsibility for climate harms.
















