Journal of Energy & Natural Resources Law (JERL)

Over the past decade, the Paris-based International Energy Agency (IEA), under the leadership of Fatih Birol, has become an important geopolitical actor in promoting the energy transition.Footnote1 ‘In the nearly nine years since he took over, Birol has led the agency’s efforts to publish a flurry of reports and analyses that show policymakers where countries are on their decarbonisation journeys and how they can accelerate’, according to recent reporting in Time magazine.Footnote

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The development of sustainable hydrogen markets will play a vital role to achieve energy sovereignty and climate neutrality by 2050. The article analyses what tools and methods are available to contribute to the development of such markets. To identify these tools and methods, the article elaborates on goals and principles of good regulation, and argues for the consideration of flexibility in the regulatory framework to be responsive to technological, societal and economic changes. Considering Germany and the draft EU hydrogen and decarbonised gas market package as case studies, the article develops the argument that legislators should consider regulatory experimentation and apply comparative methods to develop well-working regulatory strategies and an appropriate set of rules for the development of the markets.

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The principle of the common heritage of mankind (CHM principle), as enshrined in Part XI of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, is the fundamental principle of sharing the resources of the international seabed area. The International Seabed Authority (the Authority) is the international institution that implements Part XI of the Convention and has the dual task of managing the exploration and exploitation of resources in the international seabed area and protecting the marine environment. This article dives into a deep analysis of the problems that have arisen in the course of the development of the sharing mechanism for resources in the international seabed area by the Authority, and further engages in the discussion on China’s domestic legislative strategies for the mechanism for sharing of resources in the international seabed area. It is argued in this article that China’s domestic deep-sea legal regime is an important part of global deep-sea governance, and has the potential to apply a ‘corrective’ function to the ‘institutional misalignment’ that occurs in the operation of the international seabed regime with the aim of promoting the sharing of resources in the international seabed area.

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Russia’s war on Ukraine and the resulting energy crisis have painfully reminded Europe that it must urgently reduce its dependence on fossil fuels. For a sustainable, secure and affordable energy future, the coming years will require a massive scale-up of renewable energy across the EU and a tremendous effort by European businesses and households to cut their energy consumption.

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Because of the excessive prices and volatility in the energy derivatives markets over the period 2021–2023, margins increased considerably, leading major European energy companies to experience liquidity stress in meeting those. As a consequence, several local governments needed to provide guarantees to avoid their default. This article includes several legislative proposals to ensure that energy firms are prudentially safer and that there exists a level playing field among financial actors active in the same market segment. Specifically, this article proposes to (1) decrease the clearing threshold for commodity derivatives under the European Market Infrastructure Regulation (EMIR), (2) narrow the definition of hedging relevant to the calculation of the clearing threshold, (3) remove the intragroup exemption possibility under EMIR, and (4) make sure that energy firms can be categorised more easily as investment firms.

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It has been over a decade since the article that kickstarted energy justice research was published in 2012. It focused on the ‘triumvirate of tenets’ of justice, which were distributive, procedural and recognition justice. Today in 2023, and with significant developments of the 2015 Paris Agreement and the UN Sustainable Development Goals, there needs to be a revision. Over time, the three tenets have become five as scholars began to advance thinking on energy justice into policymaking. Energy justice now is creating an impact, and policymakers and governments are beginning to recognise its value for meeting energy and climate targets. Energy justice can be a vehicle for investment and also for improving the socio-economic performance of an economy. Adopting the now five principles (tenets) of energy justice reduces the inherent risks in the energy sector and more broadly in society. The now five principles (moving beyond tenets) of energy justice are: distributive, procedural, restorative, recognition and cosmopolitan justice. These have been integrated into significant law and policy documents in the United States and Colombia, in 2022 and 2023. It is just a matter of time before many other countries begin to utilise them to achieve transformative change in their societies.

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This book provides a comprehensive discussion of the Land and Environment Court in New South Wales (NSW), Australia (hereafter, the Court), detailing conceptual frameworks to understand the Court as a legal institution, its role and contributions to the current Australian legal system from its establishment until now, spanning the past four decades.

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Any attempt to write about the UK’s decision to withdraw from membership of the European Union (EU), and do so in relation to its implications for the UK and EU energy economies, will quickly run into two problems. Firstly, a focus on the decision itself and the pros and cons of the arguments made in the preceding referendum is not likely to prove useful or even interesting to many readers, especially those outside the European region or even inside much of the EU itself. Secondly, arguments about energy played no significant part in the debate about continuing UK membership or, at least initially, the negotiations about an actual withdrawal.

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This authoritative analysis is timely as the industry and its lead regulator balance the statutory objective of maximising economic recovery (MER) with the energy transition. There has never been such an in-depth study of the UK’s new upstream regulatory regime, and this will be an invaluable resource for years to come.

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