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World's top 21 fossil fuel firms found responsible for at least $209bn in annual climate change damages, according to a new study published in the peer-reviewed journal One Earth.

It makes a case for those most responsible for the climate emergency to compensate victims, and for the first time ever puts price tag on climate damages owed by top companies such as Saudi Aramco, ExxonMobil, Shell, BP, Chevron, and other leading fossil fuel producers.

The question of "who should pay for climate damages" is increasingly raised in the scientific literature, among climate movements, and in the policy debate, in particular with respect to the Loss and Damage mechanism.

This work proposes a morally-based responsibility of oil, gas, and coal producers to pay reparations, presents a methodological approach for their implementation, and for the first time quantifies annual payments for the top fossil fuel companies from 2025 to 2050.

The top 21 producers of fossil fuels globally are collectively responsible for $5.4 trillion in expected economic costs from climate change over 2025-2050, or $209 billion per year on average, according to Marco Grasso (University of Milan-Bicocca) and CAI's Richard Heede published in the peer-reviewed journal, One Earth: Time to pay the piper.

Building on the Carbon Majors Database, which records data on the emissions of the largest carbon polluters, the study quantifies annual payments owed by the top 21 fossil fuel companies from 2025 to 2050 in compensation for the expected extreme weather and other climate change damages caused by their operational and product emissions from 1988 to 2022.

Total global economic damages to be expected from climate change are estimated at $99 trillion between 2025 and 2050, assessed by a consensus survey of 738 climate economists.

After accounting for non-fossil fuel sources of warming, future economic damages due to fossil fuel emissions are estimated at $69.6 trillion 2025-2050. The study conservatively attributes one third of these climate costs to the global fossil fuel industry, and one third each to governments and consumers.

The global fossil fuel industry is thus found to be responsible for $23.2 trillion in expected GDP loss from climate change impacts over 2025-2050, or $893 billion per year.

To calculate the responsibilities of individual firms, the authors referred to their emissions since 1988, the year the IPCC was established, arguing that "since 1988, claims of scientific uncertainty about the consequences of carbon emissions are untenable."

About half of the warming experienced so far has happened since that date, and climate change impacts experienced in the coming decades will, in large part, be driven by emissions produced since the late 1980s.

Based on their share of emissions over 1988-2022, the 21 largest oil, gas and coal firms are therefore responsible for $5,444 billion in expected lost GDP over 2025-2050, or $209 billion per year.