Law and the Environment 2019

The Role of Environmental Law in the Transition to Sustainability

The Centre for Law & the Environment at the School of Law, University College Cork will host the 17^th Annual Law and the Environment Conference, a unique event in the Irish environmental calendar, on Thursday, 11 April 2019.  The conference theme this year is The Role of Environmental Law in the Transition to Sustainability.

Registration for the conference is now open and delegates may register here.

The annual Law & the Environment Conference provides a forum for the expert presentation of legal developments and research results in the area of environmental law, regulation and policy, as well as an informal forum for the exchange of views among policy-makers and regulators, regulated operators, the environmental NGO community and Irish (and overseas) academic researchers.

The conference programme can be accessed at Law and Environment 2019. 

Postgraduate Research Symposium 2019

The 11th Annual Postgraduate Research Symposium on Environmental Law will take place on Wednesday April 10th 2019 at UCC School of Law.  The Symposium offers an opportunity for postgraduate researchers working in the area of Environmental Law (broadly understood) to meet, network and present their research to their peers.  Postgrad researchers from around the world will take part in this year's symposium and abstracts of their presentations can be found at Postgraduate Symposium 2019.  

All are welcome to attend the presentations which will take place from 9.20am on Wednesday April 10th in Room G18, Aras na Laoi, UCC.

2018 Conference Summary

For too long the progressive elaboration of primary rules of environmental law, setting out substantive requirements and standards of conduct has lacked the accompanying conditions, measures and mechanisms necessary for establishing responsibility for their breach.

However, recent developments bear witness to a diverse range of initiatives concerning Environmental Responsibility, Accountability and Liability, which suggest that the public and civil society, as well as environmental regulators and other authorities, are focusing more on the need to deter the behaviour ultimately responsible for environmental degradation, and to mobilise the resources required to remedy such impacts.

Different aspects of this trend can be observed at the national, EU/regional, transnational and global levels.

In order to promote a better understanding of such developments, this year’s Law and the Environment conference offers a host of Irish and international expert speakers exploring a range of issues related to Environmental Responsibility, Accountability and Liability, including, for example:

• Recent developments in climate litigation;
• Legal arrangements regarding financial provision for environmental liabilities;
• Alternative legal methods for environmental enforcement;
• The legal implications of ‘Brexit’;
• Responsibility under international marine and maritime law;
• Just arrangements for the transition to a low-carbon economy; and
• The role of the Aarhus Convention and its Compliance Committee.

Watch the key conference presentations 2018