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2011

Climate Change

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Articles 1 - 19 of 19

Full-Text Articles in Law

Labor Unions And Climate Change, Jon Foster Dec 2011

Labor Unions And Climate Change, Jon Foster

Jon Foster

The challenge of climate change and the need for a shift to more ecologically sustainable methods of production and innovation can dramatically redefine the strategy and objectives of the labor movement as a whole. Furthermore, within the specific sectors of: Agriculture, Construction, Utilities, and Automobiles, the reality of a changing environment, and social views, has already begun redefining what the future of these industries will mean in relation to labor unions.


Imperial Ignition: Ecological Debt, Greenhouse Development Rights And Climate Change, Jonathan Stribling Nov 2011

Imperial Ignition: Ecological Debt, Greenhouse Development Rights And Climate Change, Jonathan Stribling

Jonathan Stribling

This paper argues for legal principles to remedy the harm done to those least responsible for yet most affected by climate change. It examines approaches to developing the concepts of ecological and climate debt in U.S. law. This paper argues for the importance of understanding ecological debt and particularly “climate debt” in order to sustainably remedy climate change. The paper also argues that the principles of capacity and responsibility, which are the basis of the Greenhouse Development Rights (GDR) framework, are critical to remedying climate debt and should be included in global climate negotiations and U.S. environmental law.


A Proposal For A Clean Technology Directive: European Patent Law And Climate Change, Matthew Rimmer Nov 2011

A Proposal For A Clean Technology Directive: European Patent Law And Climate Change, Matthew Rimmer

Matthew Rimmer

This article charts the conflicted, dissonant policies of the European Union towards intellectual property and climate change. It contends that there is a mismatch between the empirical work of the European Patent Office and the quietist policy options contemplated by the European Union. This article contends that the European Union needs to develop a Clean Technology Directive to allow for a differentiated approach to patent law and clean technologies – especially given the past complicity of the European Union in global warming and climate change. It highlights essential elements in a comprehensive policy package for the reform of patent law …


Defendants Win "Round One" Of Climate Change Litigation In United States Supreme Court, Richard O. Faulk, John S. Gray Aug 2011

Defendants Win "Round One" Of Climate Change Litigation In United States Supreme Court, Richard O. Faulk, John S. Gray

Richard Faulk

In American Electric Power Co. v. Connecticut (“AEP”), the United States Supreme Court held that federal common law public nuisance claims seeking injunctive relief against emitters of greenhouse gases (“GHG”) were displaced by the Clean Air Act (“CAA”) and EPA’s regulatory implementation of the Act’s provisions. In hindsight, this holding seems an inevitable outgrowth of Massachusetts v. EPA, 549 U.S. 497 (2007), which held that GHGs are pollutants subject to CAA regulation. Building on that precedent in a unanimous 8-0 opinion, the AEP Court gave the defendant utility companies a clear-cut victory by precluding judicial direct regulation of GHG through …


Responsibility To Protect, Libya To Japan, Linda A. Malone Apr 2011

Responsibility To Protect, Libya To Japan, Linda A. Malone

Popular Media

No abstract provided.


The Patent System And Climate Change, Joshua Sarnoff Mar 2011

The Patent System And Climate Change, Joshua Sarnoff

College of Law Faculty

The amount of greenhouse gas emissions and consequent climate changes and social responses will depend substantially upon the rapid development and widespread dissemination of a wide variety of new mitigation and adaptation technologies. The international approach adopted by the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change in Cancun will focus the worldwide innovation system more closely on private funding and markets, and thus on the acquisition of patents at the front end of the coming innovation pipeline. The choice to rely on private markets and patents is highly debatable. But it is certain to create substantial tensions for the patent system …


A Political Question: Public Nuisance, Climate Change And The Courts, Richard O. Faulk, John S. Gray Mar 2011

A Political Question: Public Nuisance, Climate Change And The Courts, Richard O. Faulk, John S. Gray

Richard Faulk

When it comes to climate change regulation, one of the great discussions of our day is whether the political branches of government or the judiciary should lead the way. Is it appropriate or wise to use the crucible of the courtroom to forge standards regarding what emission levels are, and are not, acceptable? In other words, is the use of tort litigation in this context a legitimate judicial exercise, or does the judiciary overstep its bounds by reaching impermissibly into the political sphere? Although the poet’s imagination may dream of leaping to seize an otherwise inaccessible prize, wise jurists know …


Uncommon Law: Ruminations On Public Nuisance, Richard O. Faulk Jan 2011

Uncommon Law: Ruminations On Public Nuisance, Richard O. Faulk

Richard Faulk

The ancient common tort of public nuisance is one of the most highly visible issues in modern tort jurisprudence. Its growth is particularly notable in climate change and environmental litigation, where it seems to be the “tort of choice” for plaintiffs seeking breathtakingly broad relief from global warming and trans-border pollution. Traditionally limited to local concerns, the tort now aspires to global dimensions, and its expanding scope has attracted review by the United States Supreme Court. If its advocates succeed, the “monster that will devour in one gulp the entire law of torts” may be afforded a prime seat at …


A Game-Theoretic Model Of International Climate Change Negotiations, Shi-Ling Hsu Jan 2011

A Game-Theoretic Model Of International Climate Change Negotiations, Shi-Ling Hsu

Shi-Ling Hsu

Exactly why the nations of the world have had difficulty in reaching agreement on reducing greenhouse gases that cause climate change is something of a puzzle. Although the future generations that will suffer the greater costs from climate change will probably be wealthier, the non-trivial risks that climate change will be catastrophic would seem to merit the collective purchase of some insurance in the form of greenhouse gas mitigation. Political economy, collective action, and psychological explanations all play a part in accounting for the international impasse, but all are incomplete. This article presents a simple game-theoretic model that illustrates the …


A Prediction Market For Climate Outcomes, Shi-Ling Hsu Jan 2011

A Prediction Market For Climate Outcomes, Shi-Ling Hsu

Shi-Ling Hsu

This article proposes a way of introducing some organization and tractability in climate science, generating more widely credible evaluations of climate science, and imposing some discipline on the processing and interpretation of climate information. I propose a two-part policy instrument consisting of (1) a carbon tax that is indexed to a "basket" of climate outcomes, and (2) nested inside this carbon tax, a cap-and-trade system of emissions permits that can be redeemed in lieu of paying the carbon tax. The amount of the carbon tax in this proposal would be set each year on the basis of some objective, non-manipulable …


How Epa Could Implement A Greenhouse Gas Naaqs, Rich Raiders Jan 2011

How Epa Could Implement A Greenhouse Gas Naaqs, Rich Raiders

Rich Raiders

Massachusetts v. EPA started a wide ranging debate concerning how, if at all, the United States Environmental Protection Agency should regulate greenhouse gases. While EPA has begun to regulate GHGs and require GHG reporting, it has not developed any comprehensive GHG regulatory strategy. This paper explores what steps EPA may, or must, take to regulate GHGs under the existing Clean Air Act. Just as EPA was forced to regulate lead as a criteria air pollutant in the 1970s, EPA now must decide if it must regulate GHGs as criteria air pollutants today. In the lead process, once EPA found that …


Energy Revolution And Disaster Response In The Face Of Climate Change, Prof. Elizabeth Burleson Jan 2011

Energy Revolution And Disaster Response In The Face Of Climate Change, Prof. Elizabeth Burleson

Prof. Elizabeth Burleson

Nuclear meltdown in Japan and civil society strife across the Middle East highlight the degree to which resilience is core to international peace and security. This article considers the means by which communities can become increasingly resilient through shared best practices across a range of climate change measures.


Changing Property In A Changing World: A Call For The End Of Perpetual Conservation Easements, Jessica Owley Jan 2011

Changing Property In A Changing World: A Call For The End Of Perpetual Conservation Easements, Jessica Owley

Journal Articles

Increasing environmental problems, including those associated with climate change, highlight the need for land conservation. Dissatisfaction with public methods of environmental protection has spurred conservationists to pursue private options. One of the most common private land conservation tools is the conservation easement. At first blush, this relatively new servitude appears to provide a creative method for achieving widespread conservation. Instead, however, conservation easements often fail to accommodate the reality of our current environmental problems. These perpetual (often private) agreements lack flexibility, making them inappropriate tools for environmental protection in the context of climate change and our evolving understanding of conservation …


Eyes On A Climate Prize: Rewarding Energy Innovation To Achieve Climate Stabilization, Jonathan H. Adler Jan 2011

Eyes On A Climate Prize: Rewarding Energy Innovation To Achieve Climate Stabilization, Jonathan H. Adler

Faculty Publications

Stabilizing atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases at double their pre-industrial levels (or lower) will require emission reductions far in excess of what can be achieved with current or projected levels of technology at a politically acceptable cost. Substantial technological innovation is required if the nations of the world are to come anywhere close to proposed emission reduction targets. Neither traditional federal support for research and development of new technologies nor traditional command-and-control regulations are likely to spur sufficient innovation. Technology inducement prizes, on the other hand, have the potential to incentivize and accelerate the rate of technological innovation in the …


The Future Of Climate Change Litigation After Aep V. Connecticut, Amanda Leiter, Rick Faulk, Eric Lasker, Mike Myers Jan 2011

The Future Of Climate Change Litigation After Aep V. Connecticut, Amanda Leiter, Rick Faulk, Eric Lasker, Mike Myers

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

No abstract provided.


The Supreme Court Disposes Of A Nuisance Suite: American Electric Power V. Connecticut, Jonathan H. Adler Jan 2011

The Supreme Court Disposes Of A Nuisance Suite: American Electric Power V. Connecticut, Jonathan H. Adler

Faculty Publications

In American Electric Power v. Connecticut the Supreme Court confronted climate change litigation for the second time. Whereas Massachusetts v. EPA was a closely divided court decision with dramatic and far-reaching legal and policy implications, AEP was a narrow, unanimous opinion that hewed closely to well-settled precedent. In AEP the Court side-stepped difficult jurisdictional questions and rejected an ambitious effort to turn the federal common law of nuisance into a judicially administered environmental regulatory regime. While not erecting any new barriers to future climate suits, the Court’s opinion raised cautions about trying to make climate change policy through the judiciary. …


Climate Change, Forests, And Federalism: Seeing The Treaty For The Trees, Blake Hudson Jan 2011

Climate Change, Forests, And Federalism: Seeing The Treaty For The Trees, Blake Hudson

University of Colorado Law Review

Despite numerous attempts over the past two decadesincluding, most recently, the Copenhagen climate discussions in late 2009-international forest and climate negotiations have failed to produce a legally binding treaty addressing global forest management activities. This failure is due in large part to a lack of U.S. leadership. Though U.S. participation in ongoing forest and climate negotiations is essential, scholars have not fully explored the potential limiting effects of federalism on the United States' treaty power in the area of forest management. Such an exploration is necessary given the debate among constitutional law scholars regarding the scope of the treaty power, …


Harmonizing Climate Change Policy And International Investment Law: Threats, Challenges And Opportunities, Daniel M. Firger, Michael Gerrard Jan 2011

Harmonizing Climate Change Policy And International Investment Law: Threats, Challenges And Opportunities, Daniel M. Firger, Michael Gerrard

Faculty Scholarship

This chapter responds to a chorus of commentary about the potential for conflict between the international investment law regime and an array of national and international actions being undertaken to mitigate and adapt to global climate change. Contrary to conventional wisdom, while some climate-friendly regulations may indeed be facially incompatible with the obligations imposed on states by typical international investment agreements (IIAs), many climate policies – especially those related to clean energy finance and technology transfer – involve principles common to foreign investment law and are largely compatible with that regime. Moreover, pending the unlikely negotiation of a single global …


International Law And Sustainable Energy: A Portrait Of Failure, David Hodas Dec 2010

International Law And Sustainable Energy: A Portrait Of Failure, David Hodas

David R. Hodas

Despite energy’s critical role in achieving nearly sustainable development and in mitigating climate change goal, internationally, sustainable energy remains a homeless orphan. In May 2007, after years of preparatory work that was thought to have produced consensus on fundamental sustainable energy policies and principles, the Commission on Sustainable Development met at CSD-15 to adopt a concrete set of specific policies and actions to make the world’s energy system more sustainable and accessible to the world’s poor. Tragically, the CSD-15 not only failed to produce agreement on any new ideas, but the pre-existing consensus on basic principles dissolved. Internationally, not a …