would be acceptable to continue producing, burning, marketing, selling, and profiting from products that would cause harm to untold millions of people, for the present, and for generations to come. Decisions made over and over again in defiance of science, of the law, and of conscience. We’ve heard what the human cost of those decisions can look like. The thing about great power is it comes with great responsibility. Through this historic investigation, the Commission sought to answer some of the biggest, compelling, and most urgent scientific and legal questions of our time: Are the activities of the respondent Carbon Majors and the fossil fuel industry as a whole linked to the harms Filipinos experienced, are experiencing, and will continue to experience? Did the Carbon majors see these harms coming? Could they have avoided or reduced the harms? What can this Commission do about it? What can the Carbon Majors do about it now? Let’s take the first Question: Are the activities of the respondent Carbon Majors and the fossil fuel industry as a whole linked to the harms Filipinos experienced, are experiencing, and will continue to experience? The answer is a resounding yes. We learned about the groundbreaking research into the historical production of fossil fuels that identified a group of entities, including investor-owned companies -- the respondent Carbon Majors -whose contributions to the climate crisis are identifiable, measurable, and significant. You may be familiar with many of these names on that list: ExxonMobil, Shell, BP, Chevron, Total, BHP Billiton, and Suncor. They are the largest corporate contributors of greenhouse gas emissions that have caused, that are causing, and will continue to cause climate change. And they have the largest responsibility and the greatest ability to act with the urgency needed. There is no other industry in the world that could have the greatest impact on steering the fate of our country, our way of life, well-being, our future prosperity. Until recently, it was hard to distinguish the fingerprint of climate change in a way that would allow scientists to say with confidence that “this drought” or “that storm” bears the mark of climate change or was more likely to happen. But now, with event attribution science, we can now detect the fingerprint of climate change on these events. It’s becoming clearer that what we once called “natural” disasters are anything but natural. Why is this important for us? Well, better science means more communities and individuals like those we heard from can better understand and prove the human rights harms they experienced and are experiencing in their day-to-day lives are connected to climate impacts. But simply understanding why a thing is happening is not enough. We have to ask, who is responsible? Closing Statement for the Petitioners | 3