A national human rights institution (NHRI), the Commission on Human Rights of the Philippines (CHR), has released a report finding that States’ human rights obligations in relation to climate change require them to regulate the fossil fuel industry. Specifically, States must compel fossil fuel companies to act with due diligence – and not obfuscate climate science or obstruct the energy transition – and provide remediation for the human rights impacts with which they have been involved. The CHR also found that, to the extent that renewable sources of energy are available, trading in fossil fuels amounts to human rights abuse and should be illegal. Here we examine how the CHR arrived at these bold conclusions.

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