The German environmental organization Deutsche Umwelthilfe (DUH) filed a climate lawsuit against the state of Baden-Württemberg at the Administrative Court in Mannheim on June 10, 2025. According to Baden-Württemberg's own climate projection report, the state will miss its legally mandated 2030 climate target by 6 million tons of CO2, representing 17 percent above the allowed limit of 36 million tons. The state is also projected to fall short of its 2040 climate neutrality goal by over 21 million tons of CO2, with the transport sector showing the largest gap at 50 percent above its 2030 target.
The state's 2023 Climate Protection Act requires the government to adopt an immediate climate protection program when targets are missed. DUH set a deadline of June 8, 2025, for the state government under Minister-President Winfried Kretschmann to present such a program, but this deadline passed without action. The lawsuit seeks to compel the state to implement additional climate measures, including accelerated energy-efficient renovation of schools and kindergartens, truck tolls on state roads, speed limits on highways, and preservation of Stuttgart's main train station configuration and railway connections.
In November 2022, DUH previously obtained judgment requiring Baden-Württemberg to present a climate protection concept, though the state government subsequently amended the climate law in February 2023. DUH now alleges that the state government is violating the revised law as well.

DUH v. Baden Wuerttemberg

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DUH v. Baden Wuerttemberg - press release

Filed

Germany

Baden-Württemberg

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An aim to achieve a quantifiable outcome within a given time-frame, set by an institution such as a national government.

Policy instruments are techniques or tools used by governing authorities to promote certain policies in order to achieve predetermined goals. Put simply, instruments are how a government tries to achieve its goals, with this taxonomy being focused on national policy instruments.

Risk is the potential for adverse consequences resulting from the dynamic interplay between (climate-related) hazards, exposure, and vulnerability of affected human or ecological systems.

Groups  of people who are adversely affected by climate change or the response to it

A set of principles, processes, and practices that build economic and political power to shift from an extractive economy to a regenerative economy.

Justice is the ethical and political framework that addresses fairness, including issues of responsibility, rights, and structural inequity.

Renewable energy means all forms of energy produced from renewable sources in a sustainable manner.

Fossil fuel is a generic term for non-renewable energy sources such as coal, fossil gas, and oil (including crude oil, and petroleum products), that can be used for electricity and heat generation. Fossil fuels are hydrocarbons formed from pressurised and heated organic material buried over millions of years.

Molecules in the atmosphere that play a key role in the greenhouse effect by trapping heat radiating from Earth’s surface.

Area of the economy in which actors engage in identical or related activities.

In human systems, the process of adjustment to actual or expected climate change and its effects, in order to moderate harm, increase resilience or exploit beneficial opportunities. In natural systems, the process of adjustment to actual climate change and its effects; human intervention may facilitate adjustment to expected climate change and its effects.

The management and allocation of funds, assets and investments to meet various objectives

A target to reduce the prevalence of a greenhouse gas over a specific time frame

A commitment to balance GHG emissions with removal by a certain point in time, effectively reducing the net emissions to zero

A long-lived, colourless gas, chiefly emitted from fossil fuel combustion, deforestation and cement production.

Activities that involve planning, designing and building infrastructure, residential, and commercial structures.

This sector involves activities to move goods and people, alongside the storage of products.

Activities of government agencies and institutions that provide public services, enforce laws and manage public resources.

DUH v. Baden Wuerttemberg - press release

Target

Greenhouse gas

Economic sector