Law Commons^™

The Law Of Sustainable Development: Keeping Pace, John R. Nolon

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

This article describes the emerging field of sustainable development law and examines whether it is up to the challenge it faces. In a world of finite resources overrun by sprawl, threatened by climate change, short on fuel, and long on greenhouse gas emissions, the law must keep pace. After discussing what sustainable development law is, the article considers the relationship between change in society and the evolution of legal principles, strategies, and practices, particularly with respect to land use, property, and natural resources. Documented in this review is the steady change exhibited in the common law applicable to the ownership, …

Success Or Failure?, Richard L. Ottinger

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

The Copenhagen Climate Conference and its Copenhagen Accord have generally been billed by the press as having been a failure. I think this is a very unfortunate mischaracterisation. The conference was a failure only in not achieving binding commitments to reduce global greenhouse gas (GHG) emission levels sufficiently to meet the requirements identified by the some 3,000 leading global scientists of the UN International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to avoid disastrous consequences – such as sea-level rise leading to massive migration, food disruption, water shortages, tropical disease migration, biodiversity destruction, etc. But the conference didn’t expect that this could …

Climate Change Displacement To Refuge, Elizabeth Burleson

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Public Trust Limits On Greenhouse Gas Trading Schemes: A Sustainable Middle Ground?, Karl S. Coplan

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

There is a some consensus among economists, environmentalists, and politicians that some form of “cap and trade’ program is the appropriate regulatory mechanism to achieve the greenhouse gas emissions reductions necessary to avoid disastrous global climate disruptions. “Cap and trade” programs necessarily incorporate tradable emissions rights – essentially tradable rights to pollute. As such, they run into principled objection by some environmentalists who oppose the notion of creating economic rights in the global commons – essentially the “right to pollute.” This principled objection derives doctrinal support from the public trust doctrine – the ancient notion rooted in common law and …

China In Context: Energy, Water, And Climate Cooperation, Elizabeth Burleson

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Climate Change Consensus: Emerging International Law, Elizabeth Burleson

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Non-State Actor Access And Influence In International Legal And Policy Negotiations, Elizabeth Burleson

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

This article analyzes the importance of increasing civil society actor access to and influence in international legal and policy negotiations, drawing from academic scholarship on governance, conservation and environmental sustainability, natural resource management, observations of civil society actors, and the authors’ experiences as participants in international environmental negotiations.

Transcript of panel discussion at McGill University, March 26, 2010. This piece is based on the article Elizabeth Burleson & Diana Pei Wu, Non-State Actor Access and Influence in International Legal and Policy Negotiations, 21 Fordham Envtl. L. Rev. 193 (2010).

Bundling Public And Private Goods: The Market For Sustainable Organics, Margot J. Pollans

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Modern agriculture has vast environmental externalities. The pesticides, fertilizers, and sediments in irrigation runoff pollute surface and groundwater; single-crop farms destroy biodiversity; and massive amounts of fossil fuels are burned in agricultural production, post-harvest processing, and shipping. Nevertheless, farming operations have largely escaped the post-1970 expansion of federal environmental regulation. Compounding the problem, federal farm policy has encouraged the very farming practices that most cause this degradation.

In 1990, Congress passed the Organic Foods Production Act (OFPA), which created an organic food certification and labeling system. While OFPA's primary purposes are to facilitate the growth of the organic sector and …

Understanding Cercla Through Webster's New World Dictionary And State Common Law: Forestalling The Federalization Of Property Law, Shelby D. Green

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act ("CERCLA") was hastily enacted in 1980 in the wake of the Love Canal disaster, where vast amounts of toxic wastes were found buried beneath a residential community. The contours of this legislation, though comprehensive in its outward scope, have been difficult to discern, largely as a consequence of vague and confusing expression. Though often the first tool resorted to for interpretation is the dictionary, the courts have looked beyond the literal terms, in an effort to determine the intended and sensible limits, consistent with both the congressional aim to reach broad categories …

Siting Green Infrastructure: Legal And Policy Solutions To Alleviate Urban Poverty And Promote Healthy Communities, Alexandra Dapolito Dunn

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Green infrastructure is an economically and environmentally viable approach for water management and natural resource protection in urban areas. This Article argues that green infrastructure has additional and exceptional benefits for the urban poor which are not frequently highlighted or discussed. When green infrastructure is concentrated in distressed neighborhoods—where it frequently is not—it can improve urban water quality, reduce urban air pollution, improve public health, enhance urban aesthetics and safety, generate green collar jobs, and facilitate urban food security. To make these quality of life and health benefits available to the urban poor, it is essential that urban leaders remove …

Investment In Water And Wastewater Infrastructure: An Environmental Justice Challenge, A Governance Solution, Alexandra Dapolito Dunn

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

This article evaluates the impact of the growing presence of privatized water and wastewater infrastructure projects in some of the world’s most populous countries: China, India, the United States, Brazil, and Nigeria. Together, these nations account for nearly 50 percent of the world’s population. The article discusses environmental justice issues associated with contaminated drinking water and insufficient sanitation and explores the role that public versus private ownership of water infrastructure plays in ensuring access to clean water for the lower-income echelons of society. It articulates the importance of the rule of law and sound environmental governance in this arena and …

Emerging Law Addressing Climate Change And Water, Elizabeth Burleson

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

The World Economic Forum recognizes that while restrictions on energy affect water systems and vise versa, energy and water policy are rarely coordinated. The International Panel on Climate Change predicts that wet places will become wetter and dry places will become dryer. Transboundary water, energy and climate coordination can occur through international consensus building.