Top court asked to reopen climate case after Ontario scraps emissions target law

TORONTO — Young activists behind a legal challenge of Ontario’s climate plan are set to ask the province’s highest court to revive their case.

Premier Doug Ford’s government put the case in limbo late last year when it gutted its own climate legislation days before it was to answer for its weakened emissions target in court.

That law was a basis for the youth-led challenge and the move to repeal it was seen by some legal experts as Ontario’s attempt to dodge accountability.

A lawyer for the climate activists says the Court of Appeal for Ontario should revisit the case and ensure a final decision is made on whether the province’s plan violates the Charter.

“We’re in a climate emergency and it’s in the interest of justice not to turn away when the government takes these kinds of cynical last-minute steps to avoid accountability,” said lawyer Fraser Thomson with the environmental law charity Ecojustice.

The premier’s office cited U.S. tariffs and economic uncertainty when the government repealed in November the legal requirement to set an emissions-reduction target and routinely update its climate plan. The plan was included at the end of the government’s fall economic statement and hurried through the legislature days before a scheduled hearing in the case.

The province did not immediately return a request for comment on Tuesday.

Ontario’s top court is expected to decide whether to reopen the appeal once written arguments from both sides are filed by April.

If the activists are successful, it would be the second time the court breathed new life into their yearslong legal saga.

The case dates back to 2018, when the Ford government scrapped the province’s cap-and-trade system and downwardly revised its 2030 emissions target.

The young people filed a constitutional challenge of the plan along with evidence to suggest the revised target would allow for the equivalent of about seven million more gas-powered cars on the road, every year from 2018 to 2030. They argued the plan committed the province to dangerously high levels of planet-warming emissions, jeopardizing their right to life and forcing them to bear the brunt of future climate impacts.

The Ontario Superior Court agreed the gap between the province’s target and what’s required to help avoid severe impacts of climate change was large and without any apparent scientific basis. Yet, the judge ultimately dismissed the case because she reasoned the young people were trying to impose on the government an obligation to fight climate change.

The Appeal Court disagreed and sent the case back to the lower court for a fresh set of hearings. It found the 2018 law effectively included a self-imposed obligation on the government to fight climate change, and it must do so in a way that complies with the Charter.

Before the new hearings could be held, the government repealed the law.

“The courts have already found that Ontario’s 2030 target is inadequate. And so instead of fixing, Doug Ford chose to remove that law and the requirement for setting climate targets,” Thomson said in an interview Tuesday.

“This is an issue that needs to be adjudicated on.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 3, 2026.

Jordan Omstead, The Canadian Press