Diploma Thesis from the year 2020 in the subject Politics - Region: Western Europe, grade: 2, University of Vienna (Institut für Europarecht, Internationales Recht und Rechtsvergleichung), language: English, abstract: This paper illuminates the relevance of European Union (EU) Energy Law and the responsibilities of States, companies and energy regulators in the EU. This relevance will be mainly in the light of EU regulations and packages, but also international Conventions applying to European actors will be tackled in this paper. First of all, the beginnings of the EU and why energy, especially coal and steel, played such a massive role from the very first start, will be pointed out. Secondly, the legal bases of EU Energy Law in force nowadays will be discussed and explained. Moreover, Energy Law is one of the rare areas where law, economy, politics, and more and more ecological affairs are rearranging the system. Thus, it will be referred to as the growing link between Energy law and Environmental policies and concerns. Last but not least, attention will be drawn to the fact that many European Energy Companies operate outside of the EU for the exploitation of resources and how accountability is triggered on the territory of the European Union in the case of an accident happening outside of Europe. Therefore, the case of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill as the responsible company Beyond Petroleum (BP) is a British multinational business, with headquarters in London, will be briefly examined. To a greater extent, the primary intention of this paper is to generate a broader understanding of EU Energy Law and the necessity to secure and regulate it in order to safeguard our environment in a future of renewable energy sources.

From evaluating policy delivery on wind farms in Texas in the US, to developing nuclear power in the Middle East, this book presents fresh thinking on key concepts and ideas on energy law and policy delivery. The contributors write from a range of perspectives, including the sciences, law, politics, economics and engineering.

Providing a critical examination of EU energy law and policy in its wider context, this book takes into account international energy markets and international energy policies, the economics of energy market regulation, geopolitical aspects of energy policy, and international developments that affect EU energy policy.

The Energy Transition, the inevitable shift away from cheap, centralized, largely fossil-based energy systems, is one of the core challenges of our time. This book provides a coherent and novel insight into the nature of this challenge and possible strategies to accelerate and guide such transitions. It brings together prominent European scholars and practitioners from the fields of energy transition research and governance to draw attention to the current complex dynamics in the energy domain, and offer elegant and provocative explanations for current crises and lock-ins. They identify multiple energy transition pathways that emerge and increasingly compete, and emphasize the need and possibilities for novel governance. By analysing the complexity of energy transition processes and the difficulties in shifting to sustainable pathways, this text questions the extent to which actually governing energy transitions is already reality, just an illusion, or a bare necessity.

The interplay between procedure and substance has not been a major point of contention for international environmental lawyers. Arguably, the topic’s low profile is due to the mostly uncontroversial nature of the field’s distinction between procedural and substantive obligations. Furthermore, the vast majority of environmental law scholars and practitioners have tended to welcome the procedural features of multilateral environmental agreements and their potential to promote regime evolution and effectiveness. However, recent developments have served to put the spotlight on certain aspects of the procedure substance topic. ICJ judgments revealed ambiguity on aspects of the customary law framework on transboundary harm prevention that the field had thought largely settled. In turn, in the treaty context, the Paris Agreement’s retreat from binding emissions targets and its decisive turn towards procedure reignited concerns in some quarters over the “proceduralization” of international environmental law. The two developments invite a closer look at the respective roles of, and the relationship between, procedure and substance in this field and, more specifically, in the context of harm prevention under customary and treaty law.

The Law of the European Union is a complete reference work on all aspects of the law of the European Union, including the institutional framework, the Internal Market, Economic and Monetary Union and external policy and action. Completely revised and updated, with many newly written chapters, this fifth edition of the most thorough resource in its field provides the most comprehensive and systematic account available of the law of the European Union (EU). Written by a new team of experts in their respective areas of European law, its coverage incorporates and embraces many current, controversial, and emerging issues and provides detailed attention to historical development and legislative history of EU law. Topics that are constantly debated in European legal analysis and practice are touched on in ways that are both fundamental and enlightening, including the following: .powers and functions of the EU law institutions and relationship among them; .the principles of equality, loyalty, subsidiarity, and proportionality; .free movement of persons, goods, services, and capital; .mechanisms of constitutional change – treaty revisions, accession treaties, withdrawal agreements; .budgetary principles and procedures; .State aid rules; .effect of Union law in national legal systems; .coexistence of EU, European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR), and national fundamental rights law; .migration and asylum law; .liability of Member States for damage suffered by individuals; .competition law – cartels, abuse of dominant position, merger control; .social policy, equal pay, and equal treatment; .environmental policy, consumer protection, public health, cultural policy, education, and tourism; .nature of EU citizenship, its acquisition, and loss; and .law and policy of the EU’s external relations. The fifth edition embraces many new, ongoing, and emerging European legal issues. As in the previous editions, the presentation is notable for its attention to how the law relates to economic and political realities and how the various policy areas interact with each other and with the institutional framework. The many practitioners and scholars who have relied on the predecessors of this definitive work for years will welcome this extensively revised and updated edition. Those coming to the field for the first time will instantly recognize that they are in the presence of a masterwork that can always be turned to with profit and that helps in understanding the rationale underlying any EU law provision or principle.