Submission to UN Special Rapporteur consultation on access to information on climate change and human rights

This report consists of a submission made in June 2024 by the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics and Political Science, in response to a call for inputs issued by the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights in the context of climate change.

The submission has been informed by research conducted using the Climate Change Laws of the World database, which is maintained by the Grantham Research Institute and is the world’s most comprehensive database on climate change legislation, litigation and public policy. The database is powered by machine learning and natural language processing technology developed by Climate Policy Radar.

For more information about the call for inputs, visit www.ohchr.org/en/calls-for-input/2024/call-inputs-access-information-climate-change-and-human-rights.

Recommendations

• States should specifically prohibit the publication of misleading corporate materials, information or data (i.e. greenwashing).
• States should set detailed standards for corporate and government data, including on military emissions, that are based on open standards to ensure they are comparable and interoperable. It may also be necessary to ensure centralisation of data management systems.
• States should take legal, administrative and other measures to ensure that civil society organisations, journalists and others are not subject to physical attacks or legal harassment (e.g. through strategic litigation against public participation [SLAPP] lawsuits).
• International organisations should play a stronger role in governing multistakeholder initiatives for climate action and sustainable development by strengthening transparency and accountability frameworks.
• States, international organisations and multistakeholder initiatives focused on standardising sustainability reporting should explore ways to integrate the climate and human rights dimensions of corporate reporting.
• International financial institutions and climate funds should revise their existing access to information policies to limit exemptions. They should also comprehensively publish information on the projects they are considering and funding, and focus on ensuring information is accessible to the communities they are intended to help.