so next on d, w, sometimes books are more exciting than real life raring to read. ah, what if there's no escape? do w literature list under german must read a mountain slope collapses. it's too hot to permafrost is melting. the cause is the rising greenhouse gases. c, o 2 emissions need to be cut much more quickly than has been planned. more and more

court rulings are calling for that. ah, the zone blake observe. a tree is perched more than 3000 meters up in the hoa town national park in austria. here scientists are studying weather and climate change. this building dates back 135 years and has withstood snowstorms and gale force winds. so far. elkin ludovic and mock olives are doing important work up here with dozens of measuring devices to climate. researches are recording the rise of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. the temperatures here have already risen on average 2 degrees celsius with knock on effects. be it was in bay, it's out there. not as i said, the summit of this is the northern terrace of is done like observatory, come on here and particular and on the northern fly. you can clearly see the

effects of climate change up here in the mountains and the measures and adaptations needed to protect this infrastructure. there's a lot of concrete under here. the entire terrace is concrete, it over a so no water can penetrate. i'm can, can, the concrete posts are also showing up the mountain peak. the reason for all these measures is climate change. permafrost normally holds together the mountains interior, but it's melting. $200.00 iron bulbs and a steel net. now stop the mountain from crumbling. although the observatory is far from any industry or other greenhouse gas emitters, the researches are finding that carbon dioxide concentrations keep on rising here at zone blake, but also at the other end of the world. at mauer low observatory on hawaii, for example. it's the same problem everywhere. and as a one, the image that the car from mount

a law is amazingly similar measurements. there was started in 1958 under the walls, longest running life. you know, we now have 420 people. and so that's point 04 percent c o 2 and the atmosphere how i almost the same as in hawaii fall and it clearly shows it doesn't matter where and when c o 2 is emitted, if it's globally distributed, super fast pio, that also means the earth will only stop hating up when c o 2 emissions drop world wide. that's precisely what happened during the coven pandemic, and was measurable at san blake. that are coupon for thornton for good upon them. yet the global shot down in a pandemic lead to a drop of about 6 percent of global c o. 2 emissions accumulates here through the to reach the paris agreements go through. we'd need to count emissions by 6 percent every year between now and 2050. the site that shows just how dramatic the reduction is that's needed. these are, these are these not when they never the turn time is pressing the

e. u ames to become climate neutral by 2050. with net 0 emissions. it remains unclear how that is to be achieved. climate change is creating anxiety. fears, felt by my teen adoption. the 27 year old decided to fight back with other climate activists. she filed a suit against an oil multinational. it's logo, a c shell. we won the court case against one of the biggest polluters of the world, shall company, which is super foul with sexy, more powerful and that's, this is one of the greater next year we're kind of starting to win shells. cool. business is oil, and petro chemicals. fossil fuels release millions of tons of c o 2, when they combust in may 2021

occurred in the hague rule, that royal dutch shell had to reduce it. c o. 2 emissions by 45 percent by 2030. it was a legal sensation also for donald pulse, a co, plaintive martina dalton made him on the dodge north sea coast. donald pulse is head of the environment organization, maliah defense. see. the judgment is the 1st in the world which calls upon a company to curb its greenhouse gas emissions. to be honest, the oh guys would not have been possible if it wasn't for people. are you in the 7000 other plaintiffs? the people that says financially supported it with more than half a 1000000 euro shell is appealing the ruling, but the judges message is loud and clear. it has set a precedent world wide. there are about one since such claims. pending is

fighting climate change in the courts, an opportunity to make real progress. martina doping things. so what drives me is activation is that the cd effects of climate change everywhere for a very long time. i mean, especially in the go double south was the flooding, se mozambique, ed oil skills in nigeria, the heat way. see you as a canada, and yet we still, we don't know anything like policy makers are waiting to act as always, love active is needed. and now it's also coming closer by like at the moment there is big flooding in the south of the lens and in germany are missing. people are dying. in july 2021 extreme rain full and catastrophic flooding the west in many, many decades, had devastating effects in western germany. many people were made homeless for months. more than 170 people died. hundreds were injured and many had to be evacuated. residence lost their homes and their livelihoods

a few days earlier, the us and canada had st. temperatures of over 50 degrees celsius. fires destroyed residential estates, and entire villages. dozens died of heat exhaustion. climate change is making extreme weather events like this more frequent. for over 30 years, scientists have been raising the alarm and urging a major rethink. before the pandemic. hundreds of thousands of young people held climate protests that hit the headlines. yet no major policy changes were forthcoming. then in april 2021, germany's constitutional court in college school were declared the federal climate change act unconstitutional in parts. the top judge's said it particularly violated the younger generations right to freedom because if car measures were too

lax, now they would lead to disproportionate costs. after 2030 these future obligations to reduce emissions have an impact on practically every type of freedom. because virtually all aspects of human life still involve the emission of greenhouse gases and are thus potentially threatened by drastic restrictions after 2030. this is that the test most far reaching top court ruling on climate change in the world for co freedom is also the freedom of future generations. and the freedom of all the people world wyatt, him was anita counterbalancing over time. so that's a sensation. felix echoed co represented the case. the law professor is the director of the research unit sustainability and climate policy in leipzig. he can see the impact of climate change in the cities. our world forest. the droughts of recent years are endangering ash, trees and sycamore maples by the expert says it's not just the woods future that's

in danger. it came, a jaime change threatens to destroy democracy's physical foundations and climate crises was water shortages and must migration will leave little behind of our free lives, which method or even of symbolic it, but vital things like the german forest things, a nature in its current form in germany, european nature will no longer exist in this form with unchecked climate change english when he the swift radical exit from fossil fuels in all sectors. felix echoed, has achieved something historic together with environmental organizations and other individuals. though the obligation to protect the environment is enshrined in the german constitution, it had led to little action. the decision is also getting a lot of attention from legal experts. up to now, only people directly affected by climate change had a chance of bringing their case to court. some constitutional law specialists

believe that it might lead to a new understanding of the law across the u. lunches. actually this is when the summer saying it's an act yo popular us and that any individual could now su, due to insufficient action on climate change. that's not quite true, but it has opened up this restrictive law and given access to the court, welcome to this and it has recognized the concern of citizens in the wider sense so that it is now possible to refer a bit to future developments. and that's important for curbing climate change. my envisioning that school from the same goal from kron across the world, people are experiencing record breaking temperatures, the zone blake, scientists are also seeing them rise. the world is only 0.9 degrees away from the maximum. 2 degree increase in the paris agreement. if global warming continues, the situation could spin out of control. to keep the tipping points in the climate

system, the changes that are no longer stopped little within a human time scale can be found throughout the entire climate system. whether it be vegetation, ocean currents, or i shall, we cannot define the temperatures that will trigger these individual or multiple tipping point us. but we know the higher that global temperatures rise up, the more likely it is that we reach these tipping points. read these the kipling, the eyes that were lucretia access to the ecological subsistence level is linked to human dignity for fossils. germany's constitutional court has made ruling about the social subsistence level when there is, of course, also an ecological one. that in turn is connected to planetary limits hypnotic bushway if we exceed these planetary limits in the so called tipping points still sooner we could face a scenario of utter destruction. this would leave us in an environment where it was practically impossible to find existential living conditions. fit for human beings . lim, spitting all 4 fingers. we continued to extract fossil fuels like coal and oil. and

so the emission of greenhouse gases continues undiminished. some $37000000000.00 tons of c o 2 are pumped into the atmosphere each year. more than the earth can cope with the earth's atmosphere is like a bath tub filling up with greenhouse gases. but the plug to drain the top is only tiny, since humans began producing more and more greenhouse gases. c, o 2 levels have risen and so have temperatures. global temperatures are now 1 point, one degrees celsius above pre industrial levels. as the boss fills up with more and more greenhouse gases, c o 2 concentrations are increasing. it can remain in the atmosphere for up to a 1000 years if the courts now calling for urgent measures to stop climate change, why is climate legislation falling so short? harridan in franconia in his party, c su, politician,

and long time parliamentarian joseph griffith has gained a reputation as a climate change pioneer. he filed the legal suit along with felix. i caught an indirect challenge to his own party. it been fair to rudely vile. i'm very happy as this is a very big signal from outside the political sphere for you to convert the polarity shake law. she had to, the political class would not have most of the strength itself to agree real climate protection measures on the require changes in life, starsky, li bidding in for which reason the court ruled in favor of yoseph kettle. even though he is not personally threatened by climate change that can't be said for his home region, which now suffers from ever longer lasting droughts. yours have double hopes the ruling will be a wake up call for his fellow lawmakers. if murphy, my estimate as that at least half of the parliamentarians really believe the things

won't become anywhere as bad as made out the meal for hash this return. shortly. alice lifestyle i law is field dark. there is a lack of awareness and that is also connected to the professional backgrounds of the lawmakers out. we didn't bill from some indie impala mean for 3 to shade di, not to her vision, shafter people with science background story to or in a minority. i a, i mean to hide this is, i instance, that's one thing. it gets done, our no pets, even the more neutral ones have a get out nodes, i'm sorry, model. and that is in we can manage the changes with improvements in technology yamaha and asked me they said a technique. but the c su politician is convinced that technological advances alone are not enough. he says there is too little time left back in life 6

o vas. felix echoed also believes speed is lessons. he plans to file further suits against the german government and says, the new climate change act doesn't go far enough. he also plans to go before the european court of human rights and my gets my the climate involves weighing up different spears of freedom. parliament you see when the parliamentary majority has exceeded its jurisdictional bounce, that we're basically suing the legislative. but anyway, i will very likely fall and of a suit i answer, but administrative decisions like planning commission for roads or power plant, scuffed hulu, so soon, face more legal challenges to class. that in this, that, that the ruling made by germany's constitutional court is not an isolated case. top courts elsewhere are also coming to similar judgments. democracies with functioning judiciary is, are leading the way judges in france. island belgium and the netherlands have reached decisions similar to their german counterparts. environmental and climate

protection is enshrined in law in many other countries. it is even part of the constitution in $110.00 states. 189 countries have signed up to the paris agreement, but it is not possible to go to court to directly enforce legal compliance. ah, how much action is being taken on the ground to curb climate change at local authority level. for example. a few years ago, a toy manufacture built a logistic center in yours of go those hometown of hayden, arable land, equivalent to 25 soccer pitches in area were covered over with concrete and asphalt, another climate killer. the business wanted more warehouses. the expansion plans are currently off the table, but the farm is next door remains suspicious. the see as you

politician and climate activist, yours of gl mates, the vis molars who mainly grow right here. the land is very fertile. the farmers are very worried. the local council might relent and give the company that go ahead monday that i, croft on, but no one asks you whether you want to sell or not. it is simply agreed. they said that the zoning plan and it has been earmarked for certain uses. and that's that for, for that's not good, and we don't want to sell it. it's our property. and we've been tending the land for generations to us or canada through the vis mueller's and use of gl argue that if land is built over to create new industrial estates, it doesn't just mean the loss of valuable arable land. agriculture is one of the few sectors which store carbon in a natural way the often in art moves open, breathable soil. so been on the valued up to now i'm in the entire climate, the bite of the be the name in here through i would say absorb c o 2 from the air

board. and the organisms in the soil ball convert that to carbon and storage in the homeless stove. on log on in indy who was car faking that is how it works as if fear for kung land farmed in a climate neutral manner. plays a vital role along with forests and more lands if local authorities and investors aim to develop greenfield sites, they can expect legal challenges in the common interest versus young guns. michigan, very important and very welcome part of the motivation behind the constitutional courts climate ruling which is that it also focuses on how freedoms are shared between the generations. and precisely, that is formulated in a long dorman article of our basic law form. it says future generations must be taken into account. that's what has happened here. i think if we don't act now and that's already late enough and the impact will be all the more drastic on future

generations come, the longer we wait, the more drastic the impact on future freedoms slides pursuing holes on measures unnecessary. but what should we do when key industries are among the biggest emitters of carbon dioxide? cement is a basic constituent of concrete and practically irreplaceable in the construction industry. worldwide, it's responsible for emitting twice as much c o 2 as air traffic. the problem is the process of turning limestone into cement. limestone contains carbon dioxide and when it's d carbonized in large furnaces, the c o 2 escapes into the atmosphere. clarkson is chemically speaking, limestone is calcium carbonate, lime and c o 2 the by these 2, split the burning process as i have to be separated. otherwise cement, wouldn't harden off to water is added to the c o. 2 emissions created during this process. other really big challenge we face in michigan for many years that the

cement industry has been working on techniques that would allow it to produce as much concrete, but with less cement, less limestone and less energy. despite rising demand. the construction industry has been booming in recent years, but that's bad news for the climate and the cement industry will not find the answer on its own over because we need a 3 pronged approach involving industry politics and society. if we don't work together, we won't succeed on all the technological challenges which we had to master up to. now they were challenges that we could more or less master on our own, procedural optimization, energy saving measures and low emission targets. we could do that, but now we are for the 1st time in a situation where we can offer the technological prerequisites on the one hand. but on the other,

we also need renewable energy. we know how difficult it is to expand capacity in this area. the whole thematic field opens up with the sure of the cement industry aims to become climate neutral by the year 2050. it's a project that will cost billions costs that could be shared with the state. yet the past to climate neutrality also presents an enormous economic opportunity for businesses that caught c o 2 emissions more quickly than they competitors in financial centers like frankfurt, it's already become apparent that companies that are profitable and climate friendly to are attracting more investors hunter hunger the founder and ceo, all right, based on science has develop a model that enables the c o 2 emissions generated throughout a company's entire value chain to be calculated.

first of all, a company's entire workflow is analyzed and all emissions are recorded. then a projection is used to work at how quickly the temperature of the earth would rise . if all companies acted in the same way. the result is a theoretical temperature in degrees celsius. just as on now and is a more data special thing about this model is that it's forward looking at if i so if i'm a business and i project my temperature in this way, it might tell me 4 degrees collect few. so if all businesses were like mine, then global warming would be 4 degrees, and that's uncomfortable. i'd rather not know that up of others, but this model also gives me the opportunity to change in the future and to say, i'm not going to carry on as before, sam, i'm going to reduce my emissions. i'm going to change my business model. i'm going to be innovative in terms of developing my business management. i mean to and again,

this data allows companies to tackle the climate impact of their business more efficiently. which areas are more harmful and which less so? curbing climate change becomes part of the business model. fund managers at one gym and bank are already using it for customers who want to invest in particularly grain businesses. the software shows in the projection how close the business would be to meeting the paras agreements low at $1.00 degree target. it has a console by it. that's the art finding, the most profitable companies, which are conforming to the paras agreement and also fulfill the expectations of the customers and the investors in terms of dividend, 60 and with the ex d. c. with our forecast, we've actually found a link between temperature and profitability and also risk if you tell me detailed, awfully vehicle the new economics, the new philosophy a company can survive when it consistently pursues climate friendly policies.

climate activists like martina dolphin and donald pulse are pursuing the same goal, but using different means they are suing big companies that are not reducing their greenhouse gas emissions quickly enough. i. p. c. c. analyses show that action is urgently needed. the earth is already 1 point one degrees warmer than before industrialization. if the global community exceeds the paris agreements, $1.00 to $2.00 degree target, the consequences will be dramatic. heat waves and droughts would directly threaten up to 420000000 people. there would be water and food shortages, severe storms would hit many coastal cities, tropical illnesses like malaria, dingey fever and the zika virus would spread across europe. recent extreme weather events showed that immediate and preventative measures unnecessary to protect people in risk areas. to discover what might happen in the future.

martina dalton is visiting the university of utrecht, earth simulation lab. she has an appointment with bio geo mo. follow just martin klein, hans, he and his team are researching how c waters find their way in land via estuaries and rivers. did geological structures of the netherlands were created this way? 500000000 years ago. from the results klein, hans concludes that humans have no option but to move out of the endangered regions and yield to the water. the dutch will tell you that the solution is that we are very powerful and water management and engineering. we need to build back in big a directional batch. and that's mostly rubbish. actually what really needs to happen is that we stop climate change as soon as possible because that's the cause or had all the world's population is living in low rowing areas, river flap, planes, coastal areas dealt ash and all those areas are going to be in big trouble,

martin klein han sees only one solution. the rapid phasing out of fossil fuels like oil and coal way, his words boast to climate activists, martina doping ahead of her visit to the you and climate change conference in glasgow on the world. we can build, sorry. i cannot close my eyes and ignorance it says, this is the only right thing to do. and it's really like touches me is it holds me from from is that like, it keeps me awake during the night. so i'm just very worried. and the only thing to do what is, is taking action and yeah, so for me it's just the only way the north sea coast of the netherlands by the end of the century, sea levels could have dramatically risen here swamping this coal fired steel works to yet since the court victory against shell

martina dobbin thinks there is a good chance that its own as might switch away from fossil fuel to up until doubt that that's the, that's the biggest polluter us melons. and they really have chains, fast to, to make sure that we can actually reach our goal for the cavity group affairs agreement. and about a year ago they were saying, yeah, we will keep on going using coal as the energy source for industry. but also the court case, we are invited, familiar defense in done those invited at data still. and they told us that we didn't, we, you know, did we have to go faster? and i think they also scared because if they won't change, then we will start a new court gate who will keep on going the route to climate mutual future. we might be able to speed up this process by taking the fight to the courts. but what humanity needs is for governments, business climate activists and societies all around the world to pull together to

achieve this goal. a little tougher. so stronger a little braver and still paid a lot less. why must women fight their way through the world of work? and how much better do they have to perform agenda the quality check

made in germany. in 30 minutes on d. w. o. in. ah, what people have to say matters to us? gone. that's why we listened to their stories. reporter, every weekend on d. w. ah .

ah ah ah, this is dw news coming to you live from berlin, moscow since thousands of troops to attack ukraine's industrial heart land as part of its new offensive in eastern ukraine. the kremlin says, capturing don bosses now it's main objective. also coming up, germany's foreign minister kicks off her tour of the baltic states with a clear message from moscow bowing nato will protect every corner of its territory to defend freedom and growing fears. in lithuania, over russian aggression. as many worry, their country could be more.