Academia
What’s at Stake in the ICJ Hearings
Representational sovereignty, Indigenous rights, and ecocide are all key to the climate obligations of states, write guest contributors Mollie Cueva-Dabkoski, Julia Phượng Nguyễn, and Molly-Mae Whitmey.
A new chapter of global climate accountability has hopefully begun, as the International Court of Justice (ICJ) prepares to issue an advisory opinion on the Obligations of States in respect of Climate Change. Hearings for that opinion began today with over 100 countries and other parties presenting over two weeks. At the request of the U.N. General …
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CONTINUE READINGA New Energy Project at UCLA Law
The Emmett Clean Energy Law & Leadership project will build a bridge between the existing expertise of UCLA’s energy law scholars and policymakers.
You don’t have to look beyond the front pages of newspapers, or beyond rooftops in your neighborhood to know that we are in the midst of a clean energy revolution, with renewable energy technologies dramatically decreasing in price and increasing in availability. These technologies promise to reduce energy cost burdens for households, as well as …
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CONTINUE READING“Salt Lakes in Crisis: Legal Responses to Ecological Catastrophes”
Upcoming U.C. Davis Law Review Symposium To Provide Interdisciplinary Focus On Threatened Western U.S. Lakes
On Friday, September 20th, the student-run U.C. Davis Law Review will host a most timely conference examining an environmental crisis facing many of the American West’s iconic “terminal lakes.” That term refers to lakes that have no natural outlet. For many years, protracted droughts and human diversions from freshwater rivers and streams feeding those lakes …
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CONTINUE READINGEnvironmental Lawyering Today
If you’d like to defend the environment as a lawyer, you should take a broad view of what that means.
To law students: The Earth not only needs a good lawyer, it needs many kinds of good lawyers doing many kinds of work. Whatever area of law interests you most, there’s no reason why you can’t be one of them.
CONTINUE READINGThe “Silver Bullet” Required to Improve California’s Water Rights System: More & Better Data
California Lags Behind Other Western States in Obtaining Critically-Needed & Available Water Diversion Data
Recently I’ve posted stories about efforts to enforce California’s water laws in the face of efforts by some diverters to evade and ignore limits on their ability to privatize public water resources–especially in times of critical drought. One post focused on the federal government’s successful criminal prosecution of a San Joaquin Valley water district manager …
CONTINUE READINGUniversities Gear Up to Fight Climate Change
Here are some recent developments at leading universities.
Universities across the country are making moves to better address climate change: creating new Schools of Sustainability and Climate, establishing research institutes, and appointing Vice Provosts for Climate Change to oversee their work.
CONTINUE READINGLGBTQ People Face Greater Climate Risks
A new study by the UCLA Williams Institute finds that LGBTQ people in same-sex couples are at greater risk of exposure to the harms of climate change compared to straight couples.
In August of 2005 when Hurricane Katrina made landfall in Louisiana and Mississippi, the combination of torrential rain and flawed infrastructure proved deadly. More than 1,800 people died and the price tag for the damage quickly rose to the tens of billions of dollars. In the chaotic disaster response that followed, several communities were disproportionately …
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CONTINUE READINGClimate Action for Earth Day
“We have a long way to go, but we’ve started down the path.” I asked my UCLA Emmett Institute colleagues what climate actions give them hope on Earth Day. Here’s how they answered.
Don’t believe what you’ve heard. There is one single thing you can give up that will help address climate change: voter apathy. One-third of eligible voters—80 million Americans—did not vote in the presidential election last time around. Why not? Because they just “weren’t registered” or they “weren’t interested in politics,” according to this Ipsos survey. …
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CONTINUE READINGCritical Insights on the Mineral Boom: Part III
On the rise of resource nationalism and building an equitable supply chain: Insights from the Emmett Institute’s “Powering the Future” symposium.
The topic of critical minerals and the energy transition is one of choices and priorities, at least according to author and journalist Ernest Scheyder, who spoke at the second panel in our recent “Powering the Future” symposium. This panel, Critical Minerals and Global Supply Chains, discussed some of the fundamental choices that governments, industry, and …
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CONTINUE READINGFifteen Years of Legal Planet
5700 blog posts later, we’re still speaking — if not “truth to power”— then our best approximation of truth, to anyone who’ll listen.
A decade and a half ago, the law school here announced the launch of a new environmental law blog by Berkeley and UCLA. The March 11, 2009 press release began: “The University of California, Berkeley, School of Law (Berkeley Law) and UCLA School of Law today announced the launch of a new blog, Legal Planet, …
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