A Dutch court ordered the government to tighten greenhouse gas pollution rules to avert the threat climate change poses to citizens, a ruling that could embolden legal challenges by environmentalists across Europe, Bloomberg said June 24.

A district court in The Hague said the government of the Netherlands has the responsibility to protect its people from climate change. The ruling backed a suit brought by Dutch environmental group Urgenda Foundation, which represents 886 residents.

Environmentalists embraced the decision, saying it would strengthen efforts to use the court in forcing governments to move faster on curbing fossil fuel damaging the climate. The Netherlands will at most reduce emissions by 17 percent from 1990 levels by the end of this decade, short of the at least 25 percent reduction ordered by the court.

“This historic ruling will have far-reaching consequences in the Netherlands, Europe and the rest of the world,” Gerben-Jan Gerbrandy, a Dutch member of the Liberal group in the European Parliament, said Wednesday by e-mail. “The Netherlands has now the legal obligation to step up its climate efforts considerably.”

Roel Vincken, a spokesman for the Dutch Environment and Infrastructure Ministry, declined to comment on the ruling when reached Wednesday by phone.

The victory by environmentalists is just one step toward involving the courts in pollution rules and may not translate to other jurisdictions, said James Cameron, the former chairman of Climate Change Capital who has advised the European Union on energy policy.

2012 Lawsuit

“There’s no automatic precedent from a domestic district court decision,” Cameron said by phone. “When people build cases, particularly in public law, they compile references from other jurisdictions by way of comparison. Some people will use it, of course.”

Urgenda had sought a 40 percent reduction from the government in its suit first filed in November 2012.

The court, citing scientific findings set out by the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, said developed countries should aim for reductions of 25 percent to 40 percent. It said that by ordering a cut a the low end of that range it was restraining itself from entering the political arena.

“It really is ground breaking,” James Thornton, chief executive officer of ClientEarth, a environmental group for lawyers, said by phone from London. “We don’t have a case before where a court has ordered a government to take steps to reduce climate change.”

The European Union has a target to reduce emissions by 20 percent from 1990 levels in 2020, and last year it fixed a 2030 reduction limit of 40 percent as it seeks to draw other nations into climate-protection policies that scientists say are needed.

“The state should not hide behind the argument that the solution to the global climate problem does not depend solely on Dutch efforts,” the court said.