How attribution science meets law: emerging connections in climate governance

Scientific advances in extreme event and impact attribution have significantly improved our ability to assess how anthropogenic climate change influences specific harms. These probabilistic, counterfactual, and multifactorial approaches are now well established within the geosciences. At the same time, courts, regulators, and international institutions are increasingly engaging with scientific evidence when addressing questions of climate responsibility, damage, and obligations. Despite growing interest, attribution science and its relevance are still not well understood within legal scholarship or legal practice, which limits its effective use in legal and policy contexts.This presentation examines how attribution science is currently recognised within the legal landscape. Rather than treating attribution as a future aspiration, it focuses on where and how attribution-related evidence appears in legal and governance contexts. The analysis adopts a multilevel perspective, considering international, EU, and national settings, and includes both judicial and non-judicial processes.The presentation highlights selected illustrative cases showing how attribution findings are beginning to appear in legal and governance contexts across different levels of climate governance, with a focus on institutional practices rather than detailed doctrinal analysis. While legal concepts such as causation and responsibility provide important background context, the emphasis is on identifying practical entry points through which attribution evidence may inform legal and policy processes.Building on this mapping exercise, the presentation reflects on key factors that currently shape the use of attribution science in legal contexts, including procedural considerations, evidentiary expectations, and institutional capacities. It also points to practical opportunities for more effective engagement, such as clearer presentation formats, greater alignment with legal procedures, and closer interaction between scientists, legal scholars, and practitioners.The central argument is that attribution science already plays a growing, though uneven, role in climate-related legal and governance processes. Better understanding where and how this engagement is taking place is a necessary step toward using attribution evidence more effectively in the future. By clarifying existing points of connection and emerging trajectories, the presentation contributes to ongoing interdisciplinary discussions on how attribution science can support more informed, accountable, and just responses to climate-related harm.