Environmental Law Research Articles

The Public Interest in Environmental Decision-Making: A Pragmatist Turn

Abstract This study is concerned with a central question in administrative law, as well as environmental law; that is, how to conceptualise and determine the public interest in complex contexts where decisions concern collective action problems, involve multiple actors, cross-temporal and spatial scales, and occur under conditions of knowledge uncertainty. Here, it is argued against the use of trade-offs in the determination of the public interest in these contexts because trade-offs involve epistemological simplifications and de-contextualise interests dismissing the nature of knowledge as a situated and dynamic collective practice. To concretise the critique, the EU Habitats Directive’s site protection management provisions are relied on as an example where decisions in the public interest are underpinned by a problematic trade-off logic. To move beyond trade-offs, the article introduces Dewey’s thought. More precisely, it is argued that Dewey’s deliberative pragmatism presents a cogent conceptualisation of the public interest, and thereby constitutes a first intellectual step to overcome the key limitations of a trade-off logic in determining the public interest in environmental decision-making.

Inconsistent Regulatory Mapping Quietly Threatens Rivers and Streams.

Even the most stringent environmental law cannot protect a river if its tributaries remain exposed to pollution and other threats upstream. Excluding a subset of watercourses from legal protection therefore threatens to alter freshwater ecosystems across entire river networks and the services they provide, such as drinking water and flood regulation. Considerable attention has been devoted to defining the scope of environmental laws protecting watercourses. Yet how these definitions are implemented through regulatory mapping, the cartography of waterbodies that legally qualify as watercourses and are thus protected, has not been examined outside of the United States. Here, we demonstrate the consequences of regulatory mapping on the extent of river networks that are protected, using France as a case study. By assembling the first map of France's watercourses protected under the Water Law, we estimate that a quarter of previously mapped hydrographic segments were excluded from protection and found stark geographical variations in the extent of protected ecosystems. Headwater and nonperennial segments are disproportionately excluded by 28% compared to their prevalence (67%) in the overall hydrographic network, with potentially far-reaching implications for biodiversity and people. We expect regulatory frameworks in most countries to be equally susceptible to local interpretation of legal definitions.

Green finance development, environmental attention and investment in hydroelectric power: From the perspective of environmental protection law

Green finance offers essential financial services to promote green economic development, focusing on mitigating climate change, protecting the environment, and advancing clean energy initiatives. This study examines the relationships among green finance development, environmental attention, and investment in clean energy (hydroelectric power) via panel data from Chinese prefecture-level cities from 2010 to 2021. The empirical results indicate that green finance significantly increases investment in hydroelectricity. Additionally, government environmental attention and public environmental concern positively moderate this relationship. The heterogeneity analysis indicates regional and scale differences in the impact of green finance on hydroelectric power investment. In particular, a more significant effect on hydroelectric power investment is observed in the western and central regions, and small-scale cities experience a similar influence that megacities do.

Investigation of microplastics and potentially toxic elements (PTEs) in sediments of two rivers in Southwestern Nigeria.

Microplastics (MPs) are emerging and ubiquitous contaminants, known to accumulate in river sediments. In many developing nations, the absence of policies for managing plastic waste puts the inland river ecosystems at risk of excessive abundance of plastics and MPs. However, only limited studies have reported MPs in river environments in these countries. The current study therefore examined the abundance and nature of MPs and potentially toxic elements (PTEs) in the sediments of the Odo-Ona and Ogun Rivers in Southwest Nigeria. MPs were extracted from the sediments using the density separation method and categorized according to their size, colour and shapes. The range of MP abundances found in the Ogun River sediments was 66.6 ± 12.2 to 311 ± 20.8 particles/kg, while that of the Odo-Ona River ranged from 133 ± 50 to 433 ± 100 particles/kg. The MPs polymer analyses revealed the presence of polyethylene (PE), polypropylene (PP) and polyamide (PA) particles in the sediments. PE was most abundant in the two rivers, constituting 72.8% and 59.7% of MPs (with 0.5 - 5mm size), recovered from the Odo-Ona and Ogun Rivers, respectively. High concentrations of Cr and Pb with ranges of 10.3 - 48.3 and 10.1 - 211mg/kg, respectively, were detected in the sediments and were associated with anthropogenic effects. This study reveals the impact of indiscriminate waste dumping on the water bodies, and calls for strict enforcement of environmental laws in the country.

Celebrating the Genesis of Multilateralism in Marine Environmental Law: Reflections from the WMU-Sasakawa Global Ocean Institute

Celebrating the Genesis of Multilateralism in Marine Environmental Law: Reflections from the WMU-Sasakawa Global Ocean Institute

Environmental ratification moves

For over 60 years, International Environmental Law has produced hundreds of texts aimed at protecting the environment at global to regional scales. Most of these texts do not gather the support of all the states concerned. The reasons for this are analysed here. This retrospective look provides a striking panorama of the current situation. The international and domestic motivations that lead a state to the sovereign decision to ratify or not a treaty, are first recalled and put into perspective in their interdependencies. The analysis of thousands of ratifications of 51 major treaties draws lines of divergence between leading states, follower states, and states reluctant to enter into environmental commitments. On a global scale the latter form a large majority, including most African and Asian states. The states of Northern and Western Europe are among the first to ratify these treaties, followed by other European states. G7 member states occupy vey contrasting normative positions. Overall, three major moves emerge from this global panorama. First, historical and persistent inequalities in the development of countries have cast an indelible shadow on environmental international multilateral treaties which do not bring the expected fruits of development. Second, in environmental matters, over the past 15 years the trend consists in establishing agreements of more restricted range (regional, bilateral), with commitments from states on fairly flexible objectives, adaptable to their social and economic context. Third, these agreements are set within the broadly negotiated and thematically inclusive principles of sustainable development.

Environmental law and systems theory

AbstractIn 1985, German sociologist Niklas Luhmann published a monograph on ecology, which appeared in English translation in 1989 as Ecological Communication. It contained many original insights for ecological thinking and, despite being well‐reviewed upon publication, has had a relatively minor impact on Anglophone environmental discourse. This inattention is also present in environmental law, which has recently seen an increase in legal theories that challenge its mainstream. This contribution first investigates why Ecological Communication has received scant attention, pointing to changes in the climatic context in which it first appeared and the reactionary nature of its arguments. Recognising that the work nevertheless contains critical theoretical insights for environmental law scholarship, the second aim of the article is to spotlight what from Ecological Communication remains relevant at the hand of three common claims progressive researchers level against mainstream environmental law: The critique of law's marriage to Cartesian dualism, that law should be better informed by climate science,of and law's anthropocentrism. Finally, environmental lawyers are called upon not to ignore Ecological Communication but to engage with it fruitfully.

Exploring the Impact of Green Finance and Green Innovation on Resource Efficiency: The Mediating Role of Market Regulations and Environmental Regulations

Green finance, innovation, and resource efficiency have gained significant traction recently, particularly in resource-rich countries. This study investigates the role of green finance and innovation in resource efficiency with the mediating lens of environmental regulations and market rules. The study employs a structural equation model on a panel of 15 resource-rich countries from 1995 to 2023. The findings illustrate a complicated interplay between the variables. First, the findings show that green financing positively and negatively affects resource efficiency. In contrast, green innovation constantly improves resource efficiency. Market rules have a favorable impact on resource efficiency. Environmental laws, however, hurt resource efficiency. Furthermore, the study reveals that green financing favors market regulations, implying that financial expenditures in green initiatives might strengthen regulatory frameworks that promote market efficiency. In contrast, green finance harms environmental rules, and green innovation harms both market and environmental regulations. In addition, we divided the sample into developed and developing nations and offered a sub-group analysis to take into consideration the variations in the degree of national development and green advances to further improve the analysis. Overall, the study emphasizes the multifaceted role of green finance and innovation in increasing resource efficiency within regulatory frameworks. These findings are critical for policymakers and stakeholders in resource-rich countries seeking to reconcile economic growth with sustainable development.

Legal frameworks for sustainable tourism: balancing environmental conservation and economic development

ABSTRACT Tourism is a vital part of the global economy but often imposes significant environmental pressure, necessitating robust legal frameworks for sustainability. This study explores the role of environmental law in promoting sustainable tourism, motivated by the need to assess the effectiveness of existing regulations. It hypothesises that while numerous international and national laws exist to mitigate tourism's environmental impacts, their effectiveness is often hindered by enforcement challenges and socio-economic factors. Using a mixed-methods approach, including a literature review and case studies, the research highlights the dual nature of tourism’s impact, showing economic benefits alongside environmental costs. Case studies from Egypt, UAE, and KSA illustrate successful sustainable practices when strong legal frameworks and community involvement are present. The study concludes that a combination of regulatory measures, economic incentives, and public-private partnerships is crucial for sustainable tourism, recommending enhanced enforcement and global cooperation.

The Role of The International Court of Justice ICJ in Redressing the Environmental Damages Caused by States During Wartime

Over the past century, it has been more evident that one manifest consequence of conflict is the detrimental impact on the environment. Although there has been beneficial growth in international environmental law, the environment has nonetheless suffered from following international armed conflicts, including the Kosovo conflict, the Iraq war, the Israel-Lebanon war, and Ukraine. In fact, there has been no legal responsibility imposed on any State for violating the responsibilities outlined in Articles 35 and 55 of Additional Protocol I. Remarkably, the International Court of Justice ICJ has acknowledged that environmental damage is eligible for compensation and to take "active restoration measures". the main problem is that the environmental damage persists even after the war has ceased. This article attempts to analyze the strengths and weaknesses of the State responsibility for environmental damage during wartime before the ICJ. This article shows the significant contributions from ICJ to protect the environment but while also showing the ambiguity related to the development of reparation for the damage caused during wartime. The purpose of this article is to examine the extent to which international law could apply to environmental damage in wartime. How much environmental damage needs to happen how much reparation must be deliberated? The article explores a methodology for evaluating environmental damage caused during a conflict by the ICJ and takes the lessons learned from the jurisprudence of the ICJ to determine the appropriate amount of compensation for such damage. This article examines the ineffectiveness of the current international legal framework for dealing with environmental damage during wartime. It provides an overview of the historical context of environmental damage in armed conflicts and a review of existing customary and conventional laws.

Virgin Land Development: History Lessons for Modern Russian Land and Environmental Law

Virgin Land Development: History Lessons for Modern Russian Land and Environmental Law

Investigating the influencing factors of evidence-based healthcare practice adoption.

In healthcare facilities, evidence-based healthcare practice (EBHP) is becoming more widely acknowledged as a critical element of patient care delivery. An increasingly important component of EBHP is the implementation of electronic health records (EHRs). This study aims to investigate factors that influence EBHP adoption in public healthcare institutions in South Africa. Four hundred and fifty patients were self-administered to healthcare professionals at an academic public hospital in Gauteng and used in this study. A total of 300 responses were available for use in the final analysis following the data cleaning procedure. Utilising structural equation modelling (SEM), the collected data were analysed. Perceived ease of use (PEOU) and perceived usefulness (PU) were found to be major variables in the adoption of EBHP along with technological, organisational and environmental factors. The technology context relative advantage (RELA) was shown to have a positive significant influence on the adoption of evidence-based healthcare practice by the PEOU and PU, with the environmental context government laws and regulations (GLRS) and organisational context organisational readiness (ORGR) coming in second and third, respectively. Perceived ease of use, PU, ORGR, and GLRS are regarded as a vital variables in the implementation of EBHP in South African public hospitals.Contribution:The study's conclusions would be helpful to policymakers as they redefine nursing practice. Furthermore, the findings heighten the consciousness of healthcare practitioners regarding the significance of employing evidence-based practice while making decisions.

Mining corruption, environmental damage, and the increasing unauthorized properties of state officials

Indonesia is blessed with natural resources in the form of minerals and coal. Their use must be directed towards the greatest welfare and prosperity of the people based on the 1945 Constitution. However, what is currently happening is the opposite. the Attorney General revealed case of alleged corruption in the trading system of tin commodities in the Bangka Belitung region. The suspects include businessmen, directors, crazy rich Indonesians, and artists who are now increasingly attracting public attention. The total state losses were equivalent to $16,667 billion USD. This research used a sociological legal research model. The research object was the legal behavior in the reality of society. It was found that to formulate appropriate law enforcement for mining corruption, Friedman’s legal system theory approach was used. This theory includes legal structures, with good synergy from each law enforcement institution. Concerning the legal substance, apart from using the Corruption Crime Law, perpetrators also need to be impoverished by regulating the crime of money laundering. In terms of legal culture, state officials should uphold ethics and integrity to achieve good governance. Meanwhile, restoration of environmental damage resulting from mining activities can begin with future environmental policies that are directed towards ensuring the safety and health of the human life as well as controlling the wise use of natural resources. The integration of environmental law and Islam can be carried out using a prophetic ethical approach. The prophetic paradigm interprets nature as something sacred as humans only borrow it and manage.

Performative Environmental Law

Performative law is law ‘just for show’. Where the law expresses a commitment to targets, objectives and aspirations which are, in a strict sense, legally binding, but which are ultimately hard to formally enforce, it can take on a highly symbolic or gestural appearance. Environmental law is particularly vulnerable to performativity. This is because of the nature of the environment as an object of law and because of the features found in much modern environmental legislation. This article shows this by considering examples from the Environment Act 2021, one of the foundational legislative environmental instruments adopted in recent years. Despite its potential, this article argues that key parts of the Act display a highly performative nature. The article shows that whilst this performativity is a feature of design rather than accident in the Act itself, it is a characteristic which is often found in environmental law more generally even though performativity need not necessarily be a bad thing.

Navigating legal frontiers: Climate change, environmental protection and armed conflict

Abstract The relationship between armed conflict, the environment and climate change is intricate and challenging to define. While international humanitarian law (IHL) includes some environmental protections, it did not anticipate the connection to climate change. Climate change can act as a risk multiplier, intensifying negative socio-economic impacts, and conflict-related environmental damage may contribute to climate change. Bridging these fields is crucial, and to this end, this article seeks to interpret IHL considering evolving understandings of armed conflict effects and progress under international environmental law (IEL). The article illustrates how existing norms can address climate change impacts in warfare, and explores how relevant IEL provisions, such as the Paris Agreement and the harm prevention principle, could be applied during armed conflicts to achieve similar goals.

A Systematic review of integrated management system frameworks: Dimensions and implication for sustainable management of construction and demolition waste

The literature has increasingly dealt with management systems, using Total Quality Management (TQM) and Integrated Management System (IMS) interchangeably. While several terminologies have been used in the literature to refer to these two, the degree of integration of the various components of the management systems varies widely between studies. Therefore, there is a high possibility that it will be difficult to find a general or appropriate model without disciplinary barriers. Therefore, this systematic literature review (SLR) provides a holistic overview assessment and guidance of key existing studies on management system frameworks, components, factors influencing the choice of IMS, and challenges. Given the lack of existing studies focusing on construction waste, particular attention is given to the construction industry. This SLR intends to: (1) identify IMS dimensions and how the concept relates to environmental and sustainability management; (2) discover IMS frameworks and factors affecting them. A typical systematic literature search method was used to analyze the articles available on SCOPUS, Web of Science, Science Direct and Google Scholar Host between 2010 and 2022, resulting in the selection of 85 theses. The results show the following: (1) Studies indicate different forms of IMS frameworks depending on their specific study area; (2) A variety of conditions and factors affect IMS implementation, including cost reduction, optimized resources, unification of internal audits; Increased staff training; (3) Several limitations were identified in the analyzed papers, such as: the alignment of sustainability practices with environmental laws. Consequently, there is a need for a more interdisciplinary IMS approach, a deeper analysis of the effectiveness of the IMS framework across industries and regions.

System behaviour of water and environmental law

Rules and procedures of mechanical things might be revealed by a piece by piece, linear analysis, while large unorganised masses can be approached by means of statistics. However, there is a vast middle layer of entities with complex structure and hardly calculable non-linear procedures that offer themselves for system science. System thinking makes possible that we understand wicked problems, perfect storms and other similar phenomena that otherwise resist the old, positivist, silo-thinking. In these cases, we learn that elements of a system form structures, develop procedures through which they together produce such results that could have been unimaginable solely by the elements alone. Is it possible that with the help of system thinking we will be able to better grasp the essence of laws, moreover, we can design and implement laws with higher effectiveness? Is law a system? Or rather a complex tiered system of sub-systems, embedded into larger social-economic systems? In order to test these questions we analyse two intriguing sets of legal problems, to learn if we can describe and interpret them as systems that are – like systems generally – protecting their integrity with accommodation and resilience. The first example is the development of the segment of water laws that regulates drilling of small size wells for farms, where we see a 140 years process off gradual, more and more successful accommodation to the double social needs of protecting the interests of small farmers and sustainable development in respect to underground waters. This system resisted successfully an abrupt change that would have not fit to its goals. The second example is climate law as such – a relatively new development in the short history of modern environmental law, which can be hardly called a success story, because of the stiff resilience of the relevant branches of law. Indeed, resilience of law, as a complex, flexible and effective system does not always work according to our wishes.

Navigating Climate Change and Sustainability Solutions: Nigeria's Role in International Environmental Law

Over the past three decades, the world has witnessed multidimensional impacts of climate change, thus emphasizing the critical urgency for climate action, and promoting sustainability. Africa is reported to disproportionately suffer the consequences of climate change. These consequences such as flooding; droughts and rising temperatures require the adoption of an environmental foreign policy to foster environmental sustainability and cross-sectoral climate resilience. As Africa’s most populous nation and second-largest oil producer significant to global oil supply, Nigeria occupies a unique and distinct position in the global climate discourse. However, despite credibly being a signatory to international bodies such as the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), Nigeria needs an effective environmental foreign policy to attain the globally desired sustainability and climate resilience. Therefore, this paper delves into Nigeria’s commitment to international environmental law of key international agreements, such as the Paris Agreement, in response to the threatening climate change crisis. The paper recognizes Nigeria as a leading contributor to greenhouse gas emissions in Africa, driving it to develop some national environmental policies that support renewable energy production and sustainability. However, most of the policies seem ineffective. This is because the country needs help with challenges ranging from political interference, corruption, unrealistic emission targets, overreliance on fossil fuels, and other socioeconomic factors. The study highlights the potential of Nigeria, the giant of Africa, in leading regional climate negotiations by localizing international environmental foreign policy and developing a strengthened legal framework to guide the African continent to sustainable development. The perspective of this paper is to encourage Nigeria to meet its sustainability objectives while fulfilling its international environmental obligations by exploring its abundant renewable energy resources such as solar, wind, and hydropower

A real-time assessment of hazardous atmospheric pollutants across cities in China and India

China and India are two of the fastest-growing developing economies covering about 35 % of the world’s population. Due to the extensive prevalence of air pollution across cities in China and India, contemporary assessment of atmospheric pollution through real-time and remote sensing observations is inadequate. The study aims to determine the spatial distribution and temporal variation of hazardous atmospheric pollutants across cities in China (Shanghai, Nanjing, Jinan, Zhengzhou and Beijing) and India (Kolkata, Asansol, Patna, Kanpur and Delhi). Ground observation data on CO, O3, PM2.5, PM10, NO2 and SO2 along with remote sensing data on AOD, CO, O3, BC, NO2, SO2 and dust surface mass concentrations are used to assess atmospheric pollution. This study examines daily, zonal and longitudinal pollutant distributions using Sentinel-5 P data and surface mass concentrations over the vertical column evaluated from NASA satellite data. The Mann-Kendall test and relative change methods have been implemented to assess pollutant trends while Sen’s Slope identifies the magnitude of change. The similarity test and data validation methods including NRMSE, PC and MBias have been employed to ensure consistency in analysing annual trends for each air pollutant in the datasets. Additionally, multiple correlation matrix analysis has been used to examine the associations among different pollutants from both datasets based on their annual averages. Remote sensing data reveals that eastern China and north-eastern India have the highest aerosol, BC, CO, NO2 and SO2 while western China and southern India lowest. Dust peaks in the west while O3 levels are highest in the northern part of China and India. Ground observation data indicates that Chinese cities have higher annual mean SO2 and O3 concentrations with yearly declines in PM2.5, PM10, NO2, SO2 and CO notably SO2. Indian cities witnessed overall increases in PM2.5, PM10, NO2 and SO2 from 2012 to 2019 with a slight decline in 2020 followed by a resurgence in 2023. The findings provide insights for implementing regional policy measures to reduce air pollution based on changes in pollutant behaviour. The study suggests that addressing atmospheric pollutants, particularly NO2, CO, PM2.5, PM10, and SO2 requires a comprehensive environmental policy framework involving central and state governments and enforcing stringent environmental protection laws.

Environmental protection tax and enterprises’ green technology innovation: Evidence from China

The Environmental Protection Tax Law was officially implemented, marking the initial establishment of China's green tax system. This paper aims to estimate whether the introduction of environmental protection tax will promote enterprises' green technology innovation. Based on data from listed enterprises from 2015 to 2021, this paper takes the implementation of environmental protection tax in 2018 as a quasi-natural experiment, and uses the DID method to evaluate the impact of the implementation of environmental protection tax on the technological innovation ability of enterprises. The results show that, after the implementation of environmental protection tax, the quantity of green patents increased significantly, while the quality of green patents decreased significantly. The analysis of mechanism channel reveals that environmental protection tax policy appears to increase the number of green patents putting regulatory pressure on enterprises and increasing R&D investment, while managerial myopia inhibits the improvement of green patent quality. The changes in the quantity and quality of green patents in large enterprises are more significant. It is also found that the quantity in coastal areas decreased significantly, while the quantity in inland areas markedly increased.