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Full-Text Articles in Law
The Law And Science Of Climate Change Attribution, Michael Burger, Jessica A. Wentz, Radley Horton
The Law And Science Of Climate Change Attribution, Michael Burger, Jessica A. Wentz, Radley Horton
Sabin Center for Climate Change Law
There is overwhelming scientific agreement that human activities are changing the global climate system and these changes are already affecting human and natural systems. The observational record shows that the planet is getting significantly warmer, with eighteen of the nineteen warmest years on record occurring since 2001. Other observed changes include rising sea levels, ocean warming and acidification, melting sea ice, thawing permafrost, increases in the frequency and severity of extreme events, and a variety of impacts on people, communities, and ecosystems. There are multiple lines of evidence linking these changes to anthropogenic influence on climate.
Legal & Scientific Integrity In Advancing A "Land Degradation Neutral World", Shelley Welton, Michela Biasutti, Michael B. Gerrard
Legal & Scientific Integrity In Advancing A "Land Degradation Neutral World", Shelley Welton, Michela Biasutti, Michael B. Gerrard
Faculty Scholarship
It is no secret that the fight against desertification isn't going well. In the two decades since the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification ("UNCCD") came into force, desertification – defined as degradation in the quality of "arid, semi-arid, and dry subhumid" land areas – has worsened considerably. Recent United Nations estimates suggest that fifty-two percent of drylands currently under agricultural cultivation are moderately or severely degraded, and 12 million hectares of productive land become barren each year due to desertification and drought. And while drylands are the focus of the UNCCD, the challenge isn't limited to them: somewhere around …
Global Warming As A Public Nuisance, Thomas W. Merrill
Global Warming As A Public Nuisance, Thomas W. Merrill
Faculty Scholarship
On July 21, 2004, eight State Attorneys General and the City of New York brought suit in federal district court in the Southern District of New York, seeking to adjudicate the issue of global warming as a public nuisance. Six large electric power producers were named as defendants. The complaint filed in Connecticut v. American Electric Power Co., as the action is styled, alleges that emissions of greenhouse gases from the defendants' plants, in particular carbon dioxide (C02), are contributing to global warming. Count I claims that these greenhouse gas emissions are an actionable public nuisance governed by federal …
Bi-Polar And Polycentric Approaches To Human Rights And The Environment, Michael Burger
Bi-Polar And Polycentric Approaches To Human Rights And The Environment, Michael Burger
Sabin Center for Climate Change Law
Within the well-established human rights system, there exist at least three ways to promote environmental ends (each of which is discussed further in Section III below): (1) mobilizing existing rights to achieve environmental ends; (2) reinterpreting existing rights to include environmental concerns; and (3) creating new rights, such as the right to a clean environment. To justify engaging in any one of these processes, an advocate must recognize both their moral legitimacy and legal utility. As one author has argued, "the justification for rights is to be found in the way in which they enable us to address a key …
Trends In The Supply And Demand For Environmental Lawyers, Michael B. Gerrard
Trends In The Supply And Demand For Environmental Lawyers, Michael B. Gerrard
Faculty Scholarship
The boom times for environmental lawyers were the late 1980s and the early 1990s. The June 1990 issue of Money magazine called environmental law a "fast-track career." Two or three years of experience with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), a state environmental agency, the environmental units of the Justice Department, or a state attorney general's office were a ticket to a high-paying job in the private sector. Law students were clamoring to enter the field and law firms were scrambling to find experienced environmental lawyers, or to recycle newly underemployed antitrust lawyers into this burgeoning field.