With more than two thousand cases filed in the United States courts where climate law, policy, or science play a central role, most judges – who are generalists – need tools to understand the scientific and technical evidence before them. The Environmental Law Institute’s (ELI) Climate Judiciary Project (CJP) helps meet this need by providing evidence-based judicial education about climate science and how it arises in the law. CJP provides education – it does not advise judges on how they should rule on any issue or in any case. This type of judicial education serves the public interest and strengthens the rule of law by helping to ensure that judges have the knowledge that they need to make independent, objective, and fair decisions.
The Need for Judicial Education
In the United States, all judges are encouraged, and most are required, to participate in judicial education. As the Federal Judicial Center (FJC), the entity that develops and administers continuing education programs for federal judges, has made clear: the continuing education of judges is invaluable and serves the public interest: “[j]udges need to enhance their understanding of law, science, history, economics, sociology, philosophy, and other disciplines. . . . Without such knowledge of the world around them, judges would be ill prepared to make informed and fair decisions.” This sort of education is routinely provided by bar associations, groups like FJC, and by nonprofit entities. ELI has decades of experience providing highly respected educational programs for judges in the United States and around the world.
CJP Meets That Need
CJP began in 2018 in coordination with the FJC and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in response to demand from the judiciary for education about climate science, a topic that is both technical in nature and increasingly referenced in litigation. CJP’s role is to provide judges with evidence-based information that allows them to stay abreast of developments in climate science and how it is arising in the law. This sort of judicial education is similar to continuing education that is made available to judges on other complex subjects such as medicine, technology, and neuroscience.
While CJP provides subject-matter expertise, judges access CJP programming through events put on by leading national and state judicial education institutions who are primarily responsible for invitation, recruitment, and other logistics. CJP has also developed a written curriculum, Climate Science and Law for Judges, which is publicly available on its website. The CJP curriculum reflects and is based on reports and assessments from authoritative sources such as the U.S. Global Change Research Program’s National Climate Assessment, the U.S. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Mathematics, and the World Meteorological Organization’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. To identify appropriate topics, structure, and approaches, CJP has an Advisory Committee comprised of scientists, lawyers, and judges. Individual modules are authored by leading scientific and legal experts in their respective disciplines, and all modules undergo a rigorous peer review process before they are released.
Setting the Record Straight
Suggestions that CJP’s judicial educational activities are improper are without merit. Its programs are no different than other judicial education programs providing training on legal and scientific topics that judges voluntarily choose to attend. Equally baseless are claims that CJP is biasing judges or trying to influence the outcome of any current or future litigation. CJP does not participate in litigation, support or coordinate with any parties related to any litigation, or advise judges on how they should rule on any issue or in any case.
There are thousands of cases in courts throughout the country raising issues related to climate change that cover an extremely wide variety of topics, including insurance, permitting, and land use. CJP’s approach to preparing judges for this reality is to ensure that they have fact-based information that they need to make independent, objective, and fair decisions. CJP does not seek to influence the outcome of any case, but rather to present factual information about the science arising in the law and the related claims and defenses made by all parties. Accusations that have been directed at CJP suggesting that its purpose is to influence the outcome of a few dozen cases that have been filed against fossil fuel companies are false.
Allegations that CJP operates in secret are also unfounded. Its written curriculum, along with its authors and advisors, are publicly available. ELI follows disclosure laws and voluntarily discloses most major individual and institutional supporters in its annual reports. ELI is proud to receive financial support from a variety of sources, including energy companies, private philanthropies, and individual donors. ELI has received federal funding from both the Trump and Biden Administrations – as well as every other administration since ELI’s inception more than fifty years ago – for discrete projects to promote clean air and water. However, no federal funding has been used to support CJP, which is privately funded. Moreover, ELI is independent; no funder dictates its work, including the work of CJP.
The Bottom Line: Well-Prepared and Independent Judges
The education CJP provides is critical to ensuring that judges, who are often generalists, have the context they need to effectively manage the evidence that will be presented by the parties in cases that come before them. As one judge who participated in CJP programming explained: “These cases are coming to our front door. The science is evolving, and we must ensure we have a baseline of knowledge so we’re prepared to handle the challenges these cases will present.” CJP fills that important role. The FJC said it best: there is a “compelling need for and many benefits of continuing education” and no “entity should seek to limit judges’ access to knowledge or censor their right to increase that knowledge.”
