Social and Scientific Uncertainties in Environmental Law

This book is made available as an open access e-book thanks to financing by Vinci Energies and Bournemouth University.

Environmental law aims to provide regulatory mechanisms to protect the environment. This requires sufficient knowledge of the environmental effects of human activities; the functioning, services and carrying capacities of ecosystems; and the technical and societal options available to mitigate the adverse effects of human activity. It also aims to develop energy, food, urban and mobility systems to achieve environmental sustainability. However, major environmental threats prevalent in the 21st century, such as climate change, biodiversity loss and emerging pollutants, pose problems for scientists trying to tackle these issues, due to their complex causes, consequences and solutions required. As clearly shown by the European Green Deal strategies, these environmental threats can only be averted by transformative policies that embrace complexity in environmental and social terms, and by determining long-term transitional pathways. Never before were the makers and subjects of regulation so eminently dependent on scientific expertise and confronted with such uncertainties. The uptake of scientific knowledge and the management of uncertainties are thus among the current challenges in the formation, design and implementation of sustainable environmental laws.

Social and Scientific Uncertainties in Environmental Law explores how environmental law is prepared or could be better equipped to employ the best available knowledge and expertise, and addresses the knowledge gaps and uncertainties in the legislative, administrative and judicial branches. Due to its multidisciplinary approach, this volume offers a fresh perspective, with each contribution providing a novel insight into the uncertainty of scientific understanding and making a valuable contribution to the field of environmental law. There is an urgent need for a variety of disciplines to come together to develop a common language to tackle the environmental issues besetting our world today, which this volume strives to meet.

About the Editors

Tilak Ginige is a senior lecturer in environmental law at Bournemouth University’s Faculty of Science and Technology. His research interests include renewable energy, mining waste, the Water Framework Directive, environmental liability, rights to nature and sustainable development law. In the past, he has contributed to the Catalan government’s environmental policy as an advisor to the president of the Generalitat of Catalunya. His other research-related achievements include involvement in EU-funded research concerning the Water Framework Directive and the EU Mining Waste Directive. He has published in several peer-reviewed journals, including the European Environmental Law Review; the Law, Environment and Development Journal (LEAD); the Journal of Water Law; and the International Journal of Liability and Scientific Enquiry. He is a proponent of the critical need for evidence-based information to guide environmental policy and law.

Iain Green has spent the last 30 years working in higher education, gaining his PhD in environmental biology in 2003. The main focus of his research is the environmental effects of pollution. This work has encompassed terrestrial, marine and freshwater ecosystems, covering all levels of biology, from the cell to communities. Iain is currently deputy head of the Department of Life and Environmental Sciences at Bournemouth University, and leads soil protection research in the Environment & Threats Strategic Research Group.

Patrick Van Calster obtained his PhD from Huddersfield University (UK). He is a criminologist with roots in philosophy. His research is both applied-driven and theoretically sophisticated and broadly concerns three interconnected topics: crime governance and policing; critical criminology, with a focus on (the violation of) human rights and privacy, (social) media, (alternative) measures of punishment, precautionary societies, and inequality and the dynamics of inclusion and exclusion; and cultural criminology (such as lifestyle, edgework, language and images/symbols).

Alain Simons is a senior lecturer in games programming, and a researcher in computer graphics and digital visualisation images. His main research is on novel techniques to reduce the file size of colourful images distributed over digital networks without the loss of image quality, therefore reducing their energy load and the ecological footprint of, for example, the Internet.

Joseph McMullen is a lecturer in law at Bournemouth University. His research focuses on the legal regulation of particulate pollution, and the impacts of air pollution on human health and wellbeing.

List of Contributors

With contributions by Alessandra Accogli (University College Dublin, Ireland), Mariusz Baran (Jagiellonian University, Poland), Rina Cindrak (Bournemouth University, United Kingdom), Soraia Da Cas (Regional Labour Court of the 4th Region, Brazil), Dimitrios Dalaklis (World Maritime University, Sweden), Nikolaos Giannopoulos (Utrecht University, the Netherlands), Tilak Ginige (Bournemouth University, United Kingdom), Yelena M. Gordeeva (RUSAL, Russia), Iain Green (Bournemouth University, United Kingdom), Oliver J. Jarvis (Researcher, United Kingdom), Rhoda Jennings (University College Cork, Ireland), Tafsir Matin Johansson (World Maritime University, Sweden), Rogier Kegge (Leiden University, the Netherlands), Nikolay Kichigin (Institute of Legislation and Comparative Law, Russia), Thomas Klenum (Liberian Registry, United States of America), Ludwig Krämer (European Commission (retired)), Hidde Kremers (Council of State, the Netherlands), Paola Martino (Lawyer, Italy), Susan Phaustus Mbayuwayu (Bournemouth University, United Kingdom), Joseph McMullen (Bournemouth University, United Kingdom), Kanak Mishra (University of Birmingham, United Kingdom), King James Nkum (Taraba State University, Nigeria), Erimma Gloria Orie (National Open University of Nigeria, Nigeria), Susanna Paleari (National Research Council, Italy), Aspasia Pastra (World Maritime University, Sweden), Marko Perišić (Hasselt University, Belgium), Matteo Riccardi (Lawyer, Italy), Janna Ringena (Higher Regional Court of Celle, Germany), Carolyn Roberts (Gresham College, United Kingdom), Merve Robson (Bournemouth University, United Kingdom), Freya Russell (Bournemouth University, United Kingdom), Linda Schönfelder (Lawyer, Germany), Hendrik Schoukens (Ghent University, Belgium), Rita Simon (Czech Academy of Sciences, Czech Republic), Alain Simons (Bournemouth University, United Kingdom), Jon A. Skinner (University of Alaska Anchorage, United States of America), Violeta Stratan (West University of Timișoara, Romania), Naomi Townsend (Bournemouth University Researcher, Australia), Ikechukwu Ugwu (University of Silesia in Katowice, Poland) and Patrick Van Calster (Bournemouth University, United Kingdom).