Digital Commons Network^™

Geographical Indications For Agricultural Products: Inconsistencies And Conflicts In Europe And The Global Arena, Lorenzo Bairati

FIU Law Review

Food systems are regulated by a global and hybrid legal framework. In fact, while supranational and international sources play an increasingly important role, private regulators are also becoming more and more involved alongside traditional public policy-makers. Within this context, Geographical Indications (GIs) serve as the main tool in the European Union and beyond to protect quality agri-food products.

This Article aims to explore these instruments in depth in order to analyze several critical aspects from the perspective of global governance, i.e., the networked, hybrid, and diffuse legal space that develops through the participation, negotiation, and strategic interaction between public and …

The Deregulation Of Cancer, Daniel G. Aaron

Utah Law Faculty Scholarship

Fifty years ago, the U.S. embarked on a radical new path. Under pressure from the environmental movement, Congress passed an array of statutes aimed at regulating carcinogens out of our world. This regulatory experiment sprawled from air and water to food and consumer products.

Legal scholars have paid scant attention to this wave of cancer regulation despite its size and importance and the public’s apparent interest in avoiding carcinogens. But there is a growing literature finding flaws with individual regimes within the framework, such as the Clean Air Act, the Toxic Substances Control Act, and the Tobacco Control Act. In …

The Colorado River: Searching For Solutions In The Face Of Uncertainty: Conference Summary, Emilia Endara, Douglas Kenney

Books, Reports, and Studies

The Colorado River is facing unprecedented change and uncertainty. Average annual flows continue to decline, and negotiations to craft post-2026 guidelines to manage the river have repeatedly bogged down in disagreements about delivery obligations, sharing shortages, and mandatory conservation. While some clarity may emerge in the coming months, the ability to sustain many existing municipal and agricultural water users is already being compromised. Meanwhile, there is growing recognition that a durable resolution must also address the water rights of sovereign Tribal Nations and better integrate environmental values into river management. All sovereigns, stakeholders, and sectors must work together now more …

Climate Preemption And Fossil Fuel Entrenchment, Vincent M. Nolette

Sabin Center for Climate Change Law

Mitigating the worst impacts of climate change demands a rapid reduction in greenhouse gas emissions and a transition to renewable, low-carbon sources of energy. This requires building thousands of gigawatts of clean energy at an unprecedented rate and expeditiously retiring existing fossil fuel infrastructure. Yet both parts of this task have been obstructed by state legislative efforts over the last decade — particularly in Republican-led states — to block local governments from reducing greenhouse gas emissions while legally mandating continued fossil fuel reliance. These efforts are accomplished through state climate preemption laws. Framed in neutral or positive terms like “energy …

The Destruction Of The Climate Spending State, Adam D. Orford

Faculty Scholarship

The Biden Administration bet big on spending laws to forward its climate policies, creating a novel “climate spending state”in a field previously approached primarily through regulation. But the second Trump Administration, building on an aggressive theory of Presidential power, with support from bicameral Congressional majorities and a sympathetic Supreme Court, has dismantled the climate spending state with startling ease and speed. Although degradation of the federal workforce and legislative alterations to the tax code have played their part, it is the Trump Administration’s refusal to administer the spending laws enacted by prior Congresses that has had the most disruptive and …

Cobalt's Climate Paradox: Global Ambitions For A Greener Future Rely On Blood-Stained Hands, Ashleigh Wootton

Natural Resources Journal

The global effort to mitigate climate change increasingly relies on widespread electrification, with lithium-ion batteries at its core and the key minerals required for their production concentrated in countries uniquely vulnerable to exploitation. Lithium-ion battery production relies heavily on cobalt, a critical mineral primarily sourced from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), which supplies approximately 70 percent of the world’s cobalt. As demand for cobalt is projected to rise sharply, the DRC has become indispensable to the global clean energy transition. Cobalt extraction in the DRC is closely linked to severe human rights abuses, including forced labor, child labor, …

Brief For Jonathan H. Adler As Amicus Curiae Supporting Respondents And Affirmance, Jonathan Adler

Briefs

Global climate change presents many complex and intractable legal and policy questions. Assuming this Court has jurisdiction, the legal questions in this case are comparatively simple and straightforward. Nothing in federal law, let alone the Constitution, preempts state-law claims seeking relief from injuries allegedly caused or exacerbated by petitioners’ conduct.

At issue in this case is whether allegedly aggrieved parties, including subnational governments, may seek redress under state law from defendants otherwise subject to state court jurisdiction for harms allegedly caused or contributed to by petitioners’ conduct. In order to succeed, respondents will ultimately need to show that the damages …

Comparison Of Groundwater Ownership Regimes In Ten Jurisdictions Across Five Continents, Gabriel Eckstein, Theo Buchler, Caleb Cook, Heping Dang, Robyn Stein, Stefano Burchi, Gabriela Cuadrado Quesada, Juan Pablo Galeano, Eric Garner, Amy Hardberger, Imad Antoine Ibrahim, Oudi Kgomongwe

Faculty Scholarship

The regulation of groundwater remains underdeveloped globally and often lags behind the domestic governance of surface water. As a result, groundwater is often subject to unfettered extraction, uses, and contamination. A clear understanding of ownership is central to the success of domestic regulations. However, the types of ownership regime in place in nations around the world are poorly documented in the academic literature. This study addresses that gap through a comparative analysis of domestic groundwater ownership regimes across ten jurisdictions in nine countries spanning five continents. It identifies three dominant models of groundwater ownership: private ownership, public ownership, and non-ownership …

Seven County Infrastructure Coalition V. Eagle County, Craig A. Rigdon

Public Land & Resources Law Review

The National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 is a landmark in United States environmental law. For more than half a century, under its authority, all federal agencies contemplating proposed actions that pose significant environmental impacts have incorporated an analysis of those impacts into their decisions. These analyses provided an avenue for opponents to challenge an agency’s final decision in federal court. Earlier this year, the Supreme Court issued a “course correction” to rein in the disparate approaches that the lower courts had applied to cases challenging federal agency decisions on NEPA grounds. The unambiguous guidance the Court lays out for …

Rural Solar Rights, Troy A. Rule

BYU Law Review

Utility-scale solar projects on private land—the fastest growing form of energy development in the United States today—generate low-cost, carbon-free electricity and can invigorate rural economies. However, they are also attracting unprecedented local opposition as local governments across the country adopt ordinances prohibiting or severely restricting solar farm development within their jurisdictions. Fortunately, state legislatures have multiple means of preventing municipal governments from unreasonably restricting solar energy. Among other things, states can legislatively preempt excessive local solar siting restrictions, manage more solar project permitting at the state government level, or statutorily require municipalities to classify solar farms as a “permitted use” …

A Soldierly March Towards Freedom: Treading Through The Great Climate War On The Arms Of Amendments And Fiduciary Duty, Karina Zakarian

Villanova Law Review (1956 - )

No abstract provided.

Rights Of Nature, Wrongs For The Commons: Risks Of Assigning Legal Personhood To The Rivers Of Washington State, Srinandan Ramachandran

Washington Journal of Social & Environmental Justice

The Rights of Nature (“RoN”) movement, which seeks to grant legal personhood to natural entities, has recently gained traction in Washington State and globally. While intended to enhance environmental protection and Indigenous sovereignty, RoN burdens commons governance by expanding the right to exclude. This paper advances a critique of proposals to grant legal personhood to rivers in Washington State, highlighting conflicts with standing, liability, and the jurisprudential tenets of legal personhood. RoN undermines equitable usufructuary access to the commons, or lands and waters without exclusionary rights, thereby impeding marginalized peoples’ ability to utilize shared resources. Instead of assigning legal personhood …

Climate Change In The Courts: A 2025 Retrospective, Maria Antonia Tigre, Margaret Barry

Sabin Center for Climate Change Law

Drawing from cases collected in the Sabin Center’s Climate Litigation Database, this report offers insights into global climate litigation developments during 2025. This third installment in our year-end series provides a snapshot of how the field of climate litigation evolved over the course of the year. The report revisits significant rulings from around the world and connects them to eight illustrative themes: (1) climate change in international courts and tribunals; (2) environmental assessment and permitting; (3) non-compliance with climate commitments; (4) constitutional and human rights; (5) greenwashing and climate-washing; (6) corporate accountability cases; (7) standing; and (8) deregulatory suits.

When Environmental Provisions Acquire Primacy Over The Economic Interests – Case Comment Of The Preliminary Ruling In Case C-626/22 C.Z. And Others V Ilva, Katarzyna Błaszczak, Michał Krzaczek

Yearbook of Antitrust and Regulatory Studies

This case note analyses the Court of Justice of the European Union’s (CJEU) preliminary ruling in case C-626/22 (C. Z. and Others v Ilva). The Court interpreted the Industrial Emissions Directive (IED), ruling that Member States cannot derogate from minimum EU environmental requirements. The ruling established that environmental permits must consider all scientifically known harmful substances that could be emitted by installations. The Court also ruled that national regulations permitting repeated extensions to deadlines for installation operations, despite the identification of serious environmental and health risks, were incompatible with the IED. The CJEU’s interpretation confirms the primacy of environmental and …

"Reeling In" The Governance Problem: How To Achieve Sustainable Fisheries On An International Scale, Louis Morais-Andrade

Brooklyn Journal of International Law

In 2025, it was estimated that over 35% of international fish stocks were overfished, risking severe depletion of high seas fisheries. In general, countries have control over fisheries within 200 nautical miles of their coastal border. Many countries have established fishery conservation laws to help prevent overfishing. Some examples of the largest domestic fishing laws are the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act and the European Union’s Common Fishery Policy (MSA), which functions as an international policy that governs all of the United States’ fisheries and the European Union’s Common Fisheries Policy (CFP). Concurrently, the United Nations has also opened …

International Trade And Climate Policy: Revising The Benefit Analysis For Countervailing Duties, Michael J. Havens

Brooklyn Journal of International Law

The United States’ Countervailing Duties Law protects domestic markets by offsetting any benefit foreign manufacturers receive from their domestic governments’ subsidy programs. The benefit analysis the Department of Commerce uses under the Countervailing Duties Law, however, is too vague. Moreover, the sole environmental exemption for otherwise countervailable subsidies is too narrow. As a result, Commerce assesses duties on an array of manufacturers burdened by foreign governments’ climate policies. The case study BGH Edelstahl v. US underscores the issue of the Countervailing Duties Law’s definition of “benefits conferred” and the limited environmental exemption. This Note compares the shortcomings of the Countervailing …

The Icj’S Advisory Opinion On Climate Change, Maria Antonia Tigre, Maxim Bönnemann, Antoine De Spiegeleir

Sabin Center for Climate Change Law

This open-access edited volume offers the first comprehensive analysis of the International Court of Justice’s 2025 Advisory Opinion on the obligations of States in respect of climate change, one of the most consequential developments in international climate law since the adoption of the Paris Agreement. Bringing together leading scholars and practitioners from across public international law, human rights law, environmental law, and global governance, the book examines how the Court reframed climate change as a matter of binding legal obligation rather than political discretion.

The contributions explore the Opinion’s articulation of state duties under treaties, customary international law, and general …

W(H)Ither Regulation? Hither To The Tax System, Tracey M. Roberts

Pace Environmental Law Review

In a series of cases decided in the last three years, four delivered in 2024 alone, the U.S. Supreme Court has directed a withering gaze toward the federal administrative state. In West Virginia v. EPA, the Court both curtailed Executive Branch regulatory authority and mandated that Congress draft with greater statutory clarity and specificity under their recently developed major questions doctrine. Under Ohio v. EPA, the Court placed on administrative agencies the burden of extraordinary vigilance in addressing comments as part of the regulatory promulgation process. In Loper Bright v. Raimondo, the Court overturned Natural Resource Defense Council v. Chevron, …

Revisiting The Meaning Of 'Forests'—In Re: T.N. Godavarman Thirumulpad V Uoi, Gayathri D. Naik

Journal of Law and Public Policy

This Case Comment reflects on the contributions of the judiciary to forest governance and management through the use of continuous mandamus in the landmark case T.N. Godavarman v UoI. It offers insights into these contributions, particularly an expansion of the understanding of ‘forests’, by examining the latest judicial decision in the Godavarman series, which was on the protection of sacred groves in Rajasthan. The expansion of the definition of ‘forests’ to include sacred groves can help accord the protection and ensure the preservation of these small forest lands with rich biodiversity and religious and cultural significance.

Between Utterance And Action: The Shaping Of Social Accountability In India’S Coastal Commons, Nayana Udayashankar, Aarthi Sridhar

Journal of Law and Public Policy

Judicial orders, management plans, and zonation maps prepared in relation to environmental laws encode the jurisprudence on accountability. Laws such as India’s Coastal Regulation Zone Notification (CRZ Notification) 2019 serve as sources of discourse on use and access rights. Such laws are crucial in shaping developmental decisions and democratic practice along the coast. As an environmental law that contains detailed articulation on judicially mandated planning, mapping, and public access to regulatory information, the CRZ Notification 2019 offers a good case to understand the relation between legal discourse and citizens’ agency. Citizens of the state of Tamil Nadu representing its small-scale …

Judicial Climate Governance: Corporate Purpose And The Courts, Hassan M. Ahmad, Ahmed R. Chowdhury

All Papers

With the existential threat of climate change, there is increased attention about the corporation's duty to maintain a healthy environment, particularly in light of the conventional shareholder primacy model of corporate purpose. This article proposes the idea of judicial climate governance. In the absence of robust legislative reforms that would obligate corporations to mitigate and even eliminate their inordinate climate impacts, in climate change litigation courts can and should render liability and compensation decisions that direct corporations towards a more stakeholder-friendly model of corporate purpose. To substantiate the need for judicial climate governance, this article canvasses and contextualizes the historical …

Rectifying The Safe Drinking Water Act And The Clean Water Act: Per- And Poly-Fluoroalkyl Substances (Pfas)—A Case Study, M. Elizabeth Goss

Kentucky Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Investigating The Relationship Between Noun Classes And Plant Folk Taxonomy In Chasu Language Of Kilimanjaro Region In Tanzania, Peter Rabson Mziray

Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences

The current study investigates the relationship between noun classes and plant folk taxonomy in Chasu (G 22). The study focuses on two objectives: the first objective is to describe the plant folk taxonomy in Chasu and the second objective is to determine the relationship between noun classes and plant folk taxonomy in Chasu. Data were collected from rural villages in Same and Mwanga districts by using free listing, field interviews (jungle-walk-and-identify), and written texts containing Chasu plant names. The findings reveal that Chasu folk taxonomy reflects different ethnobotanical categories; including a unique beginner which is mmea/mimea ‘plant(s)’, and three life …

The Localist Roots Of Climate Litigation, Jonathan H. Adler

Popular Media

No abstract provided.

Appropriations By Any Other Name: The Illegality And Unconstitutionality Of Supplemental Environmental Projects, Andrew Olson

Notre Dame Law Review

This Note fleshes out the history of SEPs and the recent arguments against them. First, Part I traces the history of SEPs, from the early use of third-party payments, through the development of formal policies governing SEPs, to the Trump and Biden administrations’ dueling approaches to them. Then Part II explains what’s wrong with SEPs. Expanding on the arguments made in the various Justice Department memoranda, this Note argues that SEPs contravene both the Miscellaneous Receipts Act (MRA) and the Antideficiency Act (ADA). Next, the Note argues that while their illegality might be remedied by statute, SEPs also present deeper—and …

Environmental Regulations And The Exploitation Of Deep Seabed Minerals : A New Era For The“Mining Code” Of The International Seabed Authority (Isa)?, Mikyla D'Antoinette Frederick-Winter

World Maritime University Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Technology Transfer In The Implementation Of The Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction Agreement, Christine Nzambi Mulatya

World Maritime University Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Trump’S Multi-Pronged Attack On Renewable Energy, Michael B. Gerrard

Faculty Scholarship

Federal policy on renewable energy took a 180-degree turn on the day of Donald Trump’s second inauguration. The Biden administration had rightly seen a massive expansion of clean energy, especially wind and solar and the associated storage and transmission, as key to moving away from fossil fuels and fighting climate change. But Mr. Trump denies that climate change is a serious problem and works to increase both the supply of and the demand for fossil fuels.

This article discusses the range of actions involved in the Trump administration’s attack on renewable energy.

An Assessment Of The Legal Framework For Prosecuting Iuu Fishing In Nigeria, Lydia Salla Kadiri

World Maritime University Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Jurisdiction Of Vessel-Source Pollution In The Eez Under Unclos : A Case Study On China, Yang Zhang

World Maritime University Dissertations

No abstract provided.