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Full-Text Articles in Law

Rethinking Sustainability To Meet The Climate Change Challenge, Michael Burger, Elizabeth Burleson, Rebecca M. Bratspies, Robin Kundis Craig, Alexandra R. Harrington, David M. Driesen, Keith H. Hirokawa, Sarah Krakoff, Katrina Fischer Kuh, Stephen R. Miller, Jessica Owley, Patrick Parenteau, Melissa Powers, Shannon M. Roesler, Jona M. Roesler Apr 2013

Rethinking Sustainability To Meet The Climate Change Challenge, Michael Burger, Elizabeth Burleson, Rebecca M. Bratspies, Robin Kundis Craig, Alexandra R. Harrington, David M. Driesen, Keith H. Hirokawa, Sarah Krakoff, Katrina Fischer Kuh, Stephen R. Miller, Jessica Owley, Patrick Parenteau, Melissa Powers, Shannon M. Roesler, Jona M. Roesler

Journal Articles

This article presents a preliminary effort to capture the dialogue at the Environmental Law Collaborative’s inaugural Workshop. Attendees engaged in the re-conceptualization of sustainability in the age of climate change, premised on evidence that climate change is forcing changes in the norms of political, social, economic, and technological standards. As climate change continues to dominate many fields of research, sustainability is at a critical moment that challenges its conceptual coherence. Sustainability has never been free from disputes over its meaning and has long struggled with the difficulties of simultaneously implementing the “triple-bottom line” components of environmental, economic, and social well-being. …


State Hazard Mitigation Plans And Climate Change: Rating The States, Matthew Babcock Jan 2013

State Hazard Mitigation Plans And Climate Change: Rating The States, Matthew Babcock

Sabin Center for Climate Change Law

Climate change is affecting and will continue to affect the frequency and severity of natural hazard events, a trend that is of increasing concern for emergency managers and hazard mitigation agencies across the United States. Proper response to these hazards will require preparation and planning. Unfortunately, states are not required to include analysis of climate change in their State Hazard Mitigation Plans, which leads to uneven treatment of the issue and missed opportunities for mitigation planning. This survey identifies those state plans that address climate change and climate-related issues in an accurate and helpful manner and those that do not. …


Envisioning Resilient Electrical Infrastructure: A Policy Framework For Incorporating Future Climate Change Into Electricity Sector Planning, Sam C.A. Nierop Jan 2013

Envisioning Resilient Electrical Infrastructure: A Policy Framework For Incorporating Future Climate Change Into Electricity Sector Planning, Sam C.A. Nierop

Sabin Center for Climate Change Law

Climate change needs to be incorporated in future designs of the electricity sector. This paper argues for a policy framework in which utilities take the lead by performing an electrical climate change impact assessment that evaluates to what extent utilities’ electrical assets are vulnerable to future climate change. Based on this assessment, electrical climate change adaptation plans should be formulated by the utility in cooperation with utility regulators, municipalities and supralocal governments. A collaborative process is essential, because adaptation measures need to be tailored to the regional circumstances and many types of adaptation measures require governmental approval. In order for …


Managed Coastal Retreat: A Legal Handbook On Shifting Development Away From Vulnerable Areas, Anne Siders Jan 2013

Managed Coastal Retreat: A Legal Handbook On Shifting Development Away From Vulnerable Areas, Anne Siders

Sabin Center for Climate Change Law

Numerous legal tools already exist to assist federal, state, and local governments in conducting managed retreat away from the most vulnerable coasts. Scattered publications, toolkits, and websites describe a broad range of legal, policy, and regulatory tools. These tools have, with little fanfare, been used by communities around the United States to implement managed retreat. This Handbook collects examples, case studies, and lessons learned from some of these early innovators in the hope that their lessons can inform future efforts to limit the exposure of our communities to coastal threats. The key legal issues raised by these examples are also …


The Derivative Right, Or Why Copyright Law Protects Foxes Better Than Hedgehogs, Daniel J. Gervais Jan 2013

The Derivative Right, Or Why Copyright Law Protects Foxes Better Than Hedgehogs, Daniel J. Gervais

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

The derivative right is at the very core of copyright theory. What can and cannot be reused to create a new work impacts freedom of expression but also impacts the value of the markets for works and their various “derivatives.” The derivative right includes forms of derivation and adaptation, such as making a movie from a novel or translating a book. It also covers what this Article refers to as penumbral derivatives, which the US Copyright Act captures using the phrase “based upon” with respect to preexisting works. This leads to indeterminacy about the scope of the derivative right, which …