Climate Initiatives and Research Facilitating the Expansion of High-integrity Voluntary Climate Action
By Lauri Peterson, Senior Researcher In recent years, various initiatives have emerged aimed at promoting voluntary climate action (VCA). Put simply, VCA consists of efforts and measures that businesses and governments undertake of their own accord, without being legally mandated or required to do so by regulatory frameworks to tackle climate change. An increasing number […]
What is energy solidarity? A view from the EU and the energy crisis
By Leonie Reins, Professor of Public Law and Sustainability, Rotterdam Erasmus School of Law and Kaisa Huhta, Associate Professor of European Law, especially Energy Law, UEF Law School. This Blog has also been published as a Blog on the GreenDeal-NET website. The recent two years have been tumultuous for the European energy sector. The Russian invasion of Ukraine in early […]
Does the new Finnish Climate Change Act promote urban climate resilience?
By Tuula Honkonen, Senior Lecturer of International Law. First published in the FMI’s Climate Bulletin: Research Letters on 27 January 2023. Although climate change is a global problem and states are the main actors in climate governance, the role of sub-national governments is increasing in this field. Finland’s national Climate Change Act, revised in 2022, […]
Mennäänkö metsään? Metsillä on haastava rooli EU:n ja Suomen ilmastotaistelussa
Dr. Seita Romppanen, yliopistonlehtori, kv-ympäristöoikeus. Julkaistu alun perin 2035Legitimacy-blogissa. EU:n Fit for 55 -lainsäädäntöpaketissa ehdotetut uudistukset kytkisivät metsät ja metsien tulevan käytön nykyistä selkeämmin osaksi kokonaisvaltaisia ilmastotoimia. Metsäsektorin rooli ilmastotavoitteiden saavuttamisessa on korvaamaton, mutta sektorin säätäminen yhä keskeisemmäksi osaksi ilmastopolitiikkaa on haastavaa. Uudistuksien tarkoituksena on ohjata kohti aiempaa tiukempia ilmastotoimia metsissä ja vahvistaa metsäsektorin osallistumista […]
Just Transition in national climate law: Lessons from Scotland
Photo by Carl Jorgensen on Unsplash Nicola Sharman The concept of just transition is going to play an increasingly prominent role in climate mitigation policy as global decarbonisation processes gather pace. Legal recognition of the concept remains limited, yet Scotland – where COP26 takes place – has positioned itself as a global leader in this […]
Environmental human rights in Kenya: between promise and reality
By Rosemary Mwanza, PhD student at the UEF Law School. Photo by pisauikan on Unsplash. This blog post is based on my recently published article entitled ‘Toxic Spaces, Community Voices, and the Promise of Environmental Human Rights in Kenya: Lessons on the Owino Uhuru Pollution Incident’, appearing in the Nordic Journal of Human Rights. The […]
Sustainable energy democracy: What is it and why does it matter?
By Kaisa Huhta, Senior Lecturer in EU law at the CCEEL Photo by Flash Dantz on Unsplash Sustainable energy democracy is a concept that has been used to understand new citizen-centred phenomena emerging in the energy transition. This blog post briefly explores the concept of sustainable energy democracy from a legal perspective, based on a […]
Taking stock of EU climate governance: key challenges
By Sebastian Oberthür. Photo by Giovanni Bianchi on Unsplash. EU climate governance has made significant progress over the past years, including an acceleration under the European Commission’s European Green Deal launched in 2019. Nevertheless, the European Union still has a long way to go to realise the climate and sustainability transition, which will require perseverance […]
Realizing the promise of Paris: Three ways of strengthening non-state and subnational climate action
By Harro van Asselt, Sander Chan, Idil Boran, Thomas Hale, Lukas Hermwille, Charles Roger. 11 December 2020. Global Governance. Harro van Asselt, Sander Chan, Idil Boran, Thomas Hale, Lukas Hermwille, Charles Roger examine opportunities to strengthen climate action by non-state and subnational actors. Article was first published on the Global Policy website on 11 December […]
Vapaaehtoisten päästöhyvitysten sääntelyyn tarvitaan selkeyttä
Hanna-Mari Ahonen, Kari Hämekoski, Matti Kahra, Kati Kulovesi, Anna Laine ja Maija Saijonmaa. Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash. Kasvava huoli ilmastonmuutoksesta on lisännyt kasvihuonekaasupäästöjen vapaaehtoisen hyvittämisen eli päästökompensaation suosiota. Julkisuuteenkin nousseet ongelmat osoittavat, että toiminnan sääntely laahaa jäljessä. Nostamme tässä kirjoituksessa esiin kaksi tärkeintä ongelmaa peräänkuuluttaen sekä selkeyttä kompensaatiomarkkinoiden toimintaympäristöön että päästökompensaatioiden laadun riittävää […]