Overview
- Advocates for the Future issued a six-month ultimatum to the Port of Rotterdam to deliver a binding plan to wind down fossil-fuel activities or the group will file suit.
- The NGO says it will base its case on earlier climate rulings, including Urgenda, Greenpeace cases, Milieudefensie v. Shell, and an International Court of Justice opinion.
- The port is the Netherlands’ largest source of CO2, with about 19 megatons of direct emissions each year, while fuel handled there drives an estimated 604 megatons of global emissions.
- AftF argues the publicly owned port has a duty to protect current and future generations and faults it for focusing only on in-harbor emissions rather than the pollution from end use.
- Port officials say they are reviewing the complaint and point to work on hydrogen infrastructure, CO2 storage, pricing incentives, and projects like Shell’s new hydrogen plant as signs of progress, while AftF warns of industrial decline without a planned, worker-safe transition.