"Norway’s Supreme Court Hears Rights Challenge to Arctic Oil Drilling", 5 November 2020.

OSLO, Norway — The Norwegian Constitution declares that all citizens have the right to a healthy environment. But Norway’s economy is built around an oil and gas industry that accounts for more than half of national exports...

The case, which began on Wednesday before a bench of 15 voting Supreme Court judges — a procedure reserved for the most significant issues — is the first climate-change litigation to be brought under the Constitution’s environmental provisions, which were passed in 2014, and experts said it was unclear how the judges would rule.

It is also among the highest-profile cases in a series of climate-change lawsuits brought by activists in Europe and elsewhere — one that Norwegian news outlets have described as “the case of the century.”...

The litigants, who include Greenpeace and Nature and Youth Norway, say they are also suing on behalf of future generations, arguing that approving oil exploration violates human rights conventions because of its contribution to increased carbon emissions...

The Norwegian government has said that it fulfilled its constitutional duty by compensating for negative effects on the environment in other areas, and that an expansive interpretation of the Constitution’s environmental provisions would “change the relationship between state powers in a fundamental manner,” and potentially erode democracy...