Appeal Court Dismisses Climate Lawsuit – CJS and Co-Plaintiffs to Consider Next Steps
Climate Justice Saskatoon (CJS) is disappointed by today’s decision from the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal to uphold the 2025 ruling from the Court of King’s Bench, which had granted the Government of Saskatchewan’s motion to strike our climate lawsuit.
We joined this legal action to stand with other people, young and old, to challenge government actions that are worsening the climate crisis. This case was an effort to affirm that our constitutional rights to life and security of person apply to government actions that accelerate dangerous climate change and its harmful impacts.
While today’s decision is a setback, it does not change the urgent need for climate justice in Saskatchewan. We remain steadfast in our belief that the province must be held accountable for its role in exacerbating climate harms and its failure to meet its obligations to current and future generations.
The federal government recently released Powering Canada Strong: A National Strategy for an Electrified Canadian Economy. Unfortunately, Saskatchewan seems to be moving in the opposite direction by slow walking grid modernization, prioritizing interconnections to the USA rather than east-west connections to neighbouring provinces, and is expanding and refurbishing unabated coal fired generation. Our province’s emissions-intensive economy and reliance on power generation via fossil fuels, including fossil gas power, put both people and ecosystems at serious risk. We need to decarbonize our electricity system as soon as possible to accelerate the transition from fossil energy to clean energy. Afterall the climate crisis is caused by humans burning fossil fuels. This is not a future problem, as human caused climate change is already happening and our government’s actions are making the problem worse.
This case aspired to challenge SaskPower’s and our government’s ongoing development of new fossil gas electrical generation. Our position is that government action – building new natural gas generation – causes harms that undermine our rights to life and security of the person under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. At its heart, this lawsuit sought to affirm that the government cannot maintain business as usual because new fossil gas generation exacerbates the climate crisis and the harmful impacts that affect all citizens.
Together with our legal counsel, we will be reviewing the court’s decision and discussing possible next steps, including avenues for appeal or further legal action. We note that the decision was not unanimous and we encourage those interested to read the entire decision, including the dissenting opinion of Justice Drennan.
This decision today is just one part of a much larger movement, and we will continue to push for systemic change through advocacy, public engagement, and solidarity with communities working to prevent climate breakdown.
We thank our legal team and everyone who continues to support this work.
Please see the decision linked below:
https://climatejusticesaskatoon.ca/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/2026SKCA099.pdf
For more information on this case, see https://www.sustainablesask.ca/court-action.html
Read previous posts related to this topic: https://climatejusticesaskatoon.ca/category/court-action/