This book is about environmental and climate legal protection in the energy transition. The Paris Agreement has a binding commitment of holding the global temperature increase to 2°C while pursuing efforts to limit it to 1.5°C. To cope with the negative effects of climate changes and mitigate greenhouse gas emissions, one of the primary responses has been the deployment of renewable energy sources, transiting from fossil fuels to sustainable electricity production. However, renewable energy sources can also cause significant environmental impacts. Wind energy, for instance, can impact biodiversity, such as birds and bats, killing them when colliding with turbines and affecting their migration and nesting. This results in conflicts in environmental law. This book questions whether, in the energy transition, the generation of electricity from renewable sources to protect the climate is compatible with the protection of the environment, both interests in environmental law. To address this question, this book follows a legal-environmental perspective and assesses the common problem of solving those internal environmental conflicts in Brazilian and German law to understand and compare whether and how both legal systems solve the conflicts by compatibilizing the protection of the climate with other environmental interests. The legal analysis focuses on land-use planning and environmental licensing, assessing similarities and differences, and evaluating the results, identifying what one country can learn from the other.

This comprehensive volume of the Elgar Encyclopedia of Environmental Law provides an overview of the major elements of energy law from a global perspective. Based on an in-depth analysis of the energy chain, it offers insight into the impacts of climate change and environmental issues on energy law and the energy sector. This timely reference work highlights the need for modern energy law to consider environmental impacts and promote the use of clean energy sources, whilst also safeguarding a reliable and affordable energy supply.

In Legal Regimes for Environmental Protection Hans-Joachim Koch, Doris König, Joachim Sanden and Roda Verheyen offer important new insights into legal questions on climate change at a regional level and the legal instruments available to address environmental problems on critical maritime topics. An international group of eminent authors put forward proposals for solving legal challenges in International Law, European Law and domestic law. Important themes including national climate protection law regulations (e.g. in the U.S.A., the EU, China and South Africa), regulations on International Fisheries, Mariculture and Environmental Protection, Regional Fisheries Management Organisations, Overfishing and Ocean Governance are addressed. This volume is of particular relevance for academic and practicing lawyers with an interest in the recent legal discussions on climate change law and Environmental Law of the Sea.

In recent years African countries have taken great strides in their response to the demand for reliable contractual and institutional forms of doing business and for high-quality dispute resolution mechanisms. Modern international arbitration has taken root, with certain countries actively embracing modern harmonized arbitral practice, and others in the process of change and development. This unprecedented volume assembles for the first time a country-by-country analysis – both practical and insightful – of how arbitration is conducted in 46 African countries, providing essential information about legislative provisions, treaty adherence, and arbitral procedure. Contributors include current and former judges, distinguished practitioners, academics, and institution-builders, all of whom are active in promoting the use of arbitration as a viable means of dispute resolution in Africa. Five sections representing the main regions of the continent, each with a substantive introductory chapter covering the major trends within that region, offer country overviews addressing issues such as the following: ; adherence to the key arbitration conventions; the modernity of a State’s arbitration legislation and its compatibility with the UNCITRAL Model Law; particular features of arbitral practice in that jurisdiction; access to and (where available) statistics from local and regional arbitral institutions; significant arbitration-related national case law; and enforcement of foreign arbitral awards. A sixth section focuses on Africa-based investor-State arbitration, providing an empirical analysis of the experience and record of African States with investment treaties and investor-State arbitration. Useful tables of intra-African bilateral investment treaties, a list of ICSID proceedings involving African States, and other tabular features round out the volume. The book will be welcomed by arbitration practitioners and legal academics everywhere as the essential guiding light in what is rapidly becoming a crucially important area of international arbitration practice.

This Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Special Report (IPCC-SRREN) assesses the potential role of renewable energy in the mitigation of climate change. It covers the six most important renewable energy sources - bioenergy, solar, geothermal, hydropower, ocean and wind energy - as well as their integration into present and future energy systems. It considers the environmental and social consequences associated with the deployment of these technologies, and presents strategies to overcome technical as well as non-technical obstacles to their application and diffusion. SRREN brings a broad spectrum of technology-specific experts together with scientists studying energy systems as a whole. Prepared following strict IPCC procedures, it presents an impartial assessment of the current state of knowledge: it is policy relevant but not policy prescriptive. SRREN is an invaluable assessment of the potential role of renewable energy for the mitigation of climate change for policymakers, the private sector, and academic researchers.

Sustainable Energy Democracy and the Law offers a legal account of the concept of sustainable energy democracy. The book explains what the concept means in a legal context and how it can be translated into concrete legal instruments.

Renewable and carbon-neutral energy have been promoted as the future of energy production in the United States. Non-traditional energy sources show promise as alternatives to fossil fuels and may provide a sustainable source of energy in increasingly uncertain energy markets. However, these new sources of energy face their own set of political, administrative, and legal challenges. Green vs. Green explores how mixed land ownership and existing law and regulation present serious challenges to the development of alternative energy sources in the United States. Analytically examining and comparing five green energy sectors; wind, solar, geothermal, biofuel and hydro power, Ryan M. Yonk, Randy T. Simmons, and Brian C. Steed argue that discussing alternative energy without understanding these pitfalls creates unrealistic expectations regarding the ability to substitute "green" energy for traditional sources. The micro-goals of protecting individual areas, species, small-scale ecosystems, and other local environmental aims often limits ability to achieve macro-goals like preventing global climate change or transitioning to large-scale green energy production. Statutes and regulations designed to protect environmental and cultural integrity from degradation directly conflict with other stated environmental ends. Although there is substantial interest in adding clean energy to the grid, it appears that localized environmental interests interfere with broader environmental policy goals and the application of existing environmental laws and regulations may push us closer to gridlock. Green vs. Green provides a fascinating look into how existing environmental law created or will create substantial regulatory hurdles for future energy generations.