Green versus green: The case against holistic environmental permitting processes

IF 6.6 2区 经济学 Q1 ECOLOGY Ecological Economics Pub Date : 2024-10-02 DOI:10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108412
Patrik Söderholm, Maria Pettersson
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Abstract

Globally, there is a strong interest in investments in zero‑carbon technologies, e.g., in industry and the electricity generation sector, but projects supporting the climate transition are argued to be held back by environmental permitting challenges. For this reason, there are calls for novel regulatory reforms that broaden the scope of environmental permitting, and the underlying legal rules, by assigning a more prominent place for projects' climate benefits, i.e., the carbon dioxide emissions displaced elsewhere in the economy. This commentary argues against such a reform, which could create more problems than it solves. It risks increasing the complexity and the uncertainty of environmental permitting process, e.g., by making it more difficult to evaluate how various legal rules should be applied in the context of individual permit applications. Such a reform also clashes with the anti-anti-environment task of environmental law and permitting. The development of zero‑carbon projects and the protection of environmental harms involve difficult trade-offs, but the main role of environmental permitting is to identify measures that allow these goals to co-exist. The solution to this green versus green dilemma is not to reform the scope of permitting processes, but rather improve the ways in which existing legislation is implemented.
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绿色对绿色:反对整体环境许可程序的理由
在全球范围内,人们对零碳技术的投资兴趣浓厚,例如在工业和发电部门,但支持气候转型的项目被认为受到环境许可挑战的阻碍。因此,有人呼吁进行新的监管改革,扩大环境许可的范围和基本法律规则,将项目的气候效益(即经济中其他地方被替代的二氧化碳排放)放在更突出的位置。本评论反对这种改革,因为它可能会带来更多的问题,而不是解决问题。它有可能增加环境许可程序的复杂性和不确定性,例如,使评估如何在个别许可申请中应用各种法律规则变得更加困难。这种改革也与环境法和环境许可的反环境任务相冲突。发展零碳项目和保护环境损害需要进行艰难的权衡,但环境许可的主要作用是确定允许这些目标共存的措施。解决这一绿色与绿色的两难问题的办法不是改革许可程序的范围,而是改进现有立法的实施方式。
本文章由计算机程序翻译,如有差异,请以英文原文为准。
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来源期刊
Ecological Economics
Ecological Economics 环境科学-环境科学
CiteScore
12.00
自引率
5.70%
发文量
313
审稿时长
6 months
期刊介绍: Ecological Economics is concerned with extending and integrating the understanding of the interfaces and interplay between "nature''s household" (ecosystems) and "humanity''s household" (the economy). Ecological economics is an interdisciplinary field defined by a set of concrete problems or challenges related to governing economic activity in a way that promotes human well-being, sustainability, and justice. The journal thus emphasizes critical work that draws on and integrates elements of ecological science, economics, and the analysis of values, behaviors, cultural practices, institutional structures, and societal dynamics. The journal is transdisciplinary in spirit and methodologically open, drawing on the insights offered by a variety of intellectual traditions, and appealing to a diverse readership. Specific research areas covered include: valuation of natural resources, sustainable agriculture and development, ecologically integrated technology, integrated ecologic-economic modelling at scales from local to regional to global, implications of thermodynamics for economics and ecology, renewable resource management and conservation, critical assessments of the basic assumptions underlying current economic and ecological paradigms and the implications of alternative assumptions, economic and ecological consequences of genetically engineered organisms, and gene pool inventory and management, alternative principles for valuing natural wealth, integrating natural resources and environmental services into national income and wealth accounts, methods of implementing efficient environmental policies, case studies of economic-ecologic conflict or harmony, etc. New issues in this area are rapidly emerging and will find a ready forum in Ecological Economics.
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