The Climate Docket is a not-for-profit news site dedicated to reporting on the growing number of climate liability lawsuits filed by communities across the country against the fossil fuel industry. These suits seek to hold the companies that have been the overwhelming drivers of global warming accountable for the costs of the impacts of climate change. These lawsuits have come under fire from not only the industry, but also many Republican-led states, which argue the courts should not have a role in deciding how the country tackles climate change and its impacts. Our site covers these lawsuits, as well as industry efforts to fight them, both in the courts and through attempts to limit these communities’ access to courts. We are not an advocacy site and cover these issues as journalists, always offering both sides opportunities to comment and participate.
The Climate Docket is a project funded by donations to Climate Communications & Law, a 501(c)3 nonprofit. Climate Communications & Law seeks to deepen the public’s understanding of the issue of climate change and how its impacts are being dealt with by the legal system in the United States and around the world.
The editorial content of CLN is not subject to approval or influence by CCL or its donors.
Climate Docket Staff:
Karen Savage, Senior Reporter and Editor
Savage is an investigative journalist who has reported on climate litigation since 2017. She has also covered the resistance to pipeline construction, juvenile justice and policing. Her work has appeared in Drilled News, Climate Liability News, Undark Magazine, In These Times, Project Earth, Juvenile Justice Information Exchange, Bridge the Gulf, Youth Today, Truthout and City Limits. Karen is an alum of the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism, where she won the Sidney Hillman Award for Social Justice Reporting.
Lynn Zinser, Editorial Advisor
Zinser is the founding editor of Climate Liability News. Previously, she was Senior Editor at InsideClimate News from 2015-17, responsible for daily content editing and production as well as editing the staff’s longer investigative projects, including ICN’s Exxon: The Road Not Taken series, which was named a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize Gold Medal for Public Service in 2016.
Before joining ICN, she spent 11 years as an editor, writer and digital producer for The New York Times. In all, she has three decades of experience in media, has won numerous writing awards in addition to helping steer award-winning projects as an editor.
Geoff Grant, Editorial Advisor
Grant, who has more than 35 years of experience in digital as well as print media, was previously Director of Digital Media and Editorial at Climate Central, then the web’s pre-eminent source of climate science research and information.
Prior to that, Grant ran his own digital strategy consulting firm, directed editorial content at MLB.com for eight years, and worked as an editor and designer at several newspapers around the country.
The CCL Board:
Kert Davies—Executive Director of the Climate Investigations Center. Davies is a well-known researcher, media spokesperson and climate activist who has been conducting corporate accountability research and campaigns for more than 20 years.
Alyssa Johl—An attorney, Johl is a veteran international environmental and human rights campaigner, and former Senior Attorney with the Climate and Energy Program at the Center for International Environmental Law.
Richard Wiles—Director of the Center for Climate Integrity at the Institute for Governance and Sustainable Development. Prior to that, Wiles was Senior Vice President at Climate Central and co-founder and Executive Director of Environmental Working Group.