Published in:Jonathan Verschuuren (ed), Research Handbook on Climate Change Adaptation Law. Research Handbooks in Environmental Law series. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham-Northampton ; 2013
Extent:
1 Online-Ressource (8 p)
Language:
English
Origination:
Footnote:
Nach Informationen von SSRN wurde die ursprüngliche Fassung des Dokuments August 21, 2013 erstellt
Description:
In adaptation literature, relatively little attention is paid to the role of basic environmental law instruments such as environmental quality standards, environmental permits and environmental impact assessments in adaptation law. In this chapter, I have reviewed the three roles these basic instruments can play in adaptation law: 1) create an overall environmental quality that makes the environment more resilient to climate change; 2) reduce the risk of (increased) pollution as a consequence of extreme weather events or of climate change more generally; 3) reduce the negative side-effects of adaptation measures on the environment. In general it can be concluded that current environmental laws already possess features that are relevant to adaptation, such as the requirement to regularly assess the permit conditions under pollution control law and the requirement to look at the long-term impacts of a project on the environment under environmental impact assessment law. However, it seems that the legislature should explicitly force regulators to take into account changing climatic conditions and extreme weather events when setting environmental quality standards or when requiring certain conditions to be met in environmental permits. Impact assessment schemes aimed at both specific projects and strategic plans should explicitly require the assessors to take long-term climate change adaptation requirements into account. The potential contribution of these environmental law instruments to climate change adaptation is simply too large not to embrace the opportunities they encompass