Search

Extractive activities constitute an essential strategic sector in the renewable transformation of the new energy model that the European Union is ambitiously promoting through numerous regulatory and strategic instruments in the last five years from the Paris Agreement until the recent approval of the proposed regulatory package "Fit for 55" and the European Climate Law, with the aim of achieving climate neutrality in 2050. To achieve this objective, the so-called critical mineral resources (CRM, critical raw materials) constitute a key element related to climate change and the development of renewable technologies of the new energy model, once again placing these activities at the center of the history of industrial and economic transformations, this time in the 21st century. Despite the impetus and attention from the European Union, through the EU Action Plan on minerals and raw materials essential for the development of strategic sectors and the promotion of their extraction, in Spain we continue in a regime of exceptionality and constitutional abnormality before the still pending Law of Bases of the Mining Regime (art. 149.1.25) that adapts the preconstitutional Law of 1973 to the organization and competences of the Autonomous State, and that dynamizes and promotes a new intelligent and environmentally climatic mining (Smart Mining) both with a current regulation in the granting of permits and concessions, as happens in the legislation of neighboring countries, as well as with the introduction of technologies that facilitate the search for resources with new prospecting methods and the resolution of mineral problems and improvement of the final products. However, maintaining a tradition of the Governments in Spain of the absence of regulatory predetermination and great discretion in their actions and decisions, paradoxically these activities have not received the slightest attention in the three pillars of our Strategic Framework for Energy and Climate, leaving a mere very punctual mention, and also in a prohibitive sense, in the recent Law on Climate Change and Energy Transition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Waste has been generating environmental problems for a long time, but some, such as packaging and plastics, have a proven utility (as we are verifying during the coronavirus epidemic); justifying the intervention of the Law. This regulation has evolved according to the perception of the environmental problems posed by waste, packaging and plastics; specifically, from the idea of "produce, use and throw away" it has moved to the circular economy. The work analyzes this normative evolution in the European Union and in Spain, from the original regulation to the current one, which already incorporates the philosophy of the circular economy, mainly in relation to plastics, and particularly at the national level, with projects and standards new in this matter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The European Green Pact (European Green Deal) constitutes the most ambitious plan in history in environmental and sustainability matters, both for the objectives set and for the planned funding, and aims to place the European Union in a position of world leadership in the field, although the coronavirus crisis generated in China and spreading rapidly throughout the world produces certain uncertainties for the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since its inception, the European Union has boosted the creation of a binding shared legal framework for the present Member States including Spain. In this context, the European Union has promoted the creation of a legal body aiming at protecting the environment which is one of its main goals. The inception of the First Environmental Action Programme in 1973 fostered the adoption of more than one hundred documents with regard to this field during the seventies. The Community has set many objectives in its environmental policy. These appear in the Article 191.1 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union. The principle of integration of the environmental protection requirements into the definition and implementation of the Union’s policies and activities (article 11), “in particular with a view to promoting sustainable development” has been the pillar upholding different policies fostering an efficient use of resources. In the field of waste management the Directive 2008/98/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council on waste and repealing certain Directives in connection with the Union's Europe 2020 strategy, harmonizes the Union’s economic development with an efficient use of resources. Consequently, one of the most ambitious Union’s claims is preventing waste generation and if they are produced, its proper management, prioritizing the waste hierarchy established in the Article 4 of the Directive: prevention, preparing for re-use, recycling, other recovery, (e.g. energy recovery) and disposal. As will be discussed, wastes from edible vegetable oils produced in the HORECA channel can be transformed in other products. Due to its polluting potential and its market value, this option has to be a priority for the Member States that must ensure an effective and efficient management of this waste flow. Additionally, we will have the opportunity of analyzing the territorial competence under the scope of the article 12.5.c).2º of the Ley 22/2011 that regulates the optional activity of local councils regarding with non-hazardous commercial wastes. Notwithstanding, the national legal framework covers the local councils in order to compel the producers of these wastes to join the municipal management system, as long as this obligation is motivated and based on criteria of efficacy and efficiency on waste management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article analyzes the mobilization of Spanish cities in the fight against climate change in the framework of the Covenant of Mayors, launched in 2008 in the European Union. Through the Covenant, cities commit to reduce greenhouse gas emissions as well as to improve their energy efficiency and increase the use of renewable energies. With more than 7,700 signatories, the Covenant is an interesting example of how cities have a decisive role In the fight against climate change and in improving the sustainability of cities. The article gives an account of concrete initiatives that Spanish cities have proposed to fulfill their commitments, ranging from the replacement of public lighting to the pedestrianisation of urban centers passing through areas the increase of green in cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article evaluates how the transition of power underway in the international system has changed international climate negotiations, as well as the way the EU has responded to this process. More specifically, and, in line with the introductory article of this edition, it is argued that, until 2005-2007, negotiations took place within a structure of normative congruence, characterised by climate institutions being set up in spite of the reluctance of a very powerful coalition of states. However, since mid-way through the first decade of the 2000s, the negotiations have entered a phase of institutional lag and the new coalition of key actors (made up of the United States and emerging countries) are imposing a new conceptual approach that has left the old institutions clearly lagging behind. The EU has responded to this change by adjusting its strategies and objectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nowadays public policies are insufficiently ambitious in order to reverse the environmental damage generated by man. Most of the literature that analyses policy changes tends to explain the incentives but do not give clear explanations about the limitation factors. We develop in this paper a reflection on policy change from the notion of transaction costs. Following a review of the three main approaches --sustainable development, ecological modernization and democratization-- we expose ten theses on the role of transaction costs in the policy change from the case of the Common Fisheries Policy of the European Union. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the United Nations conference on environment and development, signed the Convention on Biological Diversity, which obliges the signatory States to combat the extinction of species throughout the world. Its executive secretary said: "the services that nature offers us are free, but the man has a deep unconscious of what he represents their destruction [...] If humanity does not brake to the degradation of biodiversity, the legacy for future generations will be mortgaged [...] must have the courage to look our children in the eye and admit failure [...] admit that we continue losing biodiversity at an unprecedented pace, we are mortgaging their future". Words that initialed by premonitions future about the treatment of the extinction of a large part of the existing biodiversity, that if we do not a treatment, their destruction would speed up and we would be going against the new scheme of sustainable development. In this paper, I analyze and discuss from the perspective of social rights, environmental, and economic, compliance with subparagraphs (c) and (d) of article 10 of the said convention in the native communities of the Peruvian Amazon, an area of permanent armed con ict between the Peruvian State and the native communities. The work consists of six parts. The first explains the legal framework and jurisprudence; the second covers the methodology, and will draw attention to the method and the approach of hypotheses; the third the theoretical framework, the geographical framework and the gathering of information; The fourth on analysis and interpretation; in the fifth set out an analogy with some of the results of the European Union and countries of south America; in the sixth part formulates some conclusions and new perspectives for the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Se presenta información sobre la legislación y jurisprudencia referidas al medio ambiente en la Unión Europea durante 2011, incluyendo el Plan Nacional de Mejora de la Calidad del Aire, la Decisión 299/2011/UE de 11 de noviembre y la Sentencia del Tribunal Constitucional de 29 de septiembre de 2011.

El artículo habla de los obligaciones establecidas bajo el Protocolo de Kioto con respecto a la reducción de emisiones en la industria empresarial. El aumento de las emisiones de gases de efecto invernadero es uno de los problemas ambientales que la Unión Europea combate. Unas de las surgerencias es el establecimiento de un mercado de compra-venta para las emisiones. La implementación de ahorros energéticos en los sectores hogares y de transporte también ayudarán a combatir la aumentación de emisiones.

El artículo habla de las repercusiones y los compromisos que se realizaron durante el Protocolo de Kioto. En cuanto a los cambios climáticos y el incremento de la temperatura, la Unión Europea (UE) está de acuerdo que los cambios son serios y que es un problema de hoy aunque el compromiso intenta reducir 30% de las emisiones hasta el año 2020. La UE también estableció la idea de un mercado global de emisiones. El Protocolo fue una oportunidad positiva para confrontar los problemas ambientales.