W6 Flashcards
Is loss and damage a new concept?
No it has underpinned climate negotiations from its inception - since 1991 there was considerations of an insurance mechanism
but
only officially become a pillar in the Paris Agreement - Article 8
What happened in the Bali Action Plan, 2007?
loss and damage as a term first appeared
What happened in Warsaw 2013?
Parties established the warsaw international mechanism on loss and damage
What is the WIM and what is their work plan?
Established in Lima 2014 –> Warsaw International Mechniams
Work plan
- impacts of L&D on particularly vulnerable developing countries, populations and communities
- comprehensive risk management approach in building resilience
- approaches to address slow onset events, with particular focus on potential impacts
- reducing the risks of and addressing non-economic losses
-capacity and coordination needs in relation to slow onset and extreme events
-migration, displacement and human mobility as a result of climate impacts
- financial instruments and tools to address the risks of loss and damage
emphasis on risk management to try and avoid future losses as well as address the challenges today
What is the definition of the loss and damage fund?
Funding arrangments for responding to loss and damage associated with the adverse effects of climate change, including a focus on addressing loss and damage
funding arrangement to assist developing countries that are particularly vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change, in responding to loss and damage, including with a focus on addressing loss and damage by providing and assisting mobilising new and additional resources
What is loss and damage?
The actual and or potential manifestation of impacts associated with climate change in developing countries that negatively affect human and natural systems
there is no one definition more working definitions
not just a damage fund because of the justice aspect - how do you value human loss and non-economic loss
What is the difference between loss and damage and Loss and Damage?
loss and damage = is the term used to describe the manifestation of adverse cc impacts which are not or cannot be avoided by adaptation and mitigation efforts ie. reducing emissions
Loss and Damage = used to describe the policies and plans that are used to address loss and damage, suchas those of the UNFCC
What does adaptation and mitigation L&D mean?
implies that migitation and adaptation is sufficient to avoid loss and damage - developed country neogitators
What does risk management L&D mean?
Emphasises comprehensive risk management aproach brining together policy agnedas like adaptation, disaster risk reduction and humanitarian assistance
focus on pragmatic and technological measures
unpolitical, insurance, private finance
What is limits to adaptation L&D?
this typology stresses that loss and damage occurs once the limits to adaptation have been reached and exceeds
emphasise the need for finance to address loss and damage when the limits to adaptation are exceeded
What is existential perspective L&D?
emphasizes the unavoidable harm that will be incurred by countries, communities, ecosystems and societies as a result of cc
the focus is on NELD, irreversible losses, justice and responsibility and compensation as a response
What are the key variables in global stocktake of L&D?
lossess and damages - recorded economic and non-economic losses incurred because of a climate-related event
Exposure to climate-related hazards - people, capital and eocysystems
Event attribution - linking events to anthropogenic cc
Vulnerability - the propensity and susceptibility of people, capital and ecosystem to suffer impacts when exposed to a hazard event
adaption readiness and financing - availability of global funding or financial aid for adaptation planning and climate readiness
Governance frameowkrs including explicit climate policies - reflect the actions or attempts to intentionally steer soceital processes to achieve a common goal
How id L&D addressed outside of the UNFCCC?
- a state can bring a claim against another for state responsibility
- Internatoinal law - ‘no harm rule’ + procedural obligations (environmental impact assessment and due diligence)
- obligations under FCC/Kyoto protcol/Paris agreement = but fuzzy obligations and obligations of conduct
- Private parties can bring claims against their own state or another state for climate-related loss and damage in international forums, if internationally protected human rights are implicated
- private parties can bring claims against their own state other private parties in domestic judicial forums
What was the Czech Republic v Poland case?
Dirtiest mines in europe
national legilsation that allowed the extension of a mining licence for Lignite mining without carrying out the EIA
What was the Southbeste and Others vs Austria case?
Failure to reduce ff industry and mitgate climate change in a meaningful ways
impediment on human rights - rights to life and freedom
What was the Bushfires suvivors for cliamte action incorporated vs EPA?
Activist group
sued the EPA for not having protected Australia from the impacts of cc and busfires
successful case
casual evidence of the role of cc in the event has led to loss and damage - attribution study was used as evidence
What was the Luciano Lliuya vs RWE case/
pending court case in germany
peruvian farmers next to a glacial lake - melting and the risk of this has dramatically increased
RWE is responsible for 0.5% of all historical emissions they have to pay 0.5% of the cost to build protection measures against potential flooding
RWE are not doing anything illegal but have to take care of the damages that you cause
this will be the first case for actual damages if successful
What are the global trends for cc litigation?
stronger progress and action of mitigation - 347 cases
- adaptation has 79 cases
loss and damage compensation is 18 cases
What are some of the legal impediements?
Finding a forum for justice
establishing the existence of clear and binding obligations
establishing breach of such obligations
What are some of the evidence impediements?
- demonstrating causality between GHG emissions and the impacts suffered by the plaintiff - attribution of events to anthropogenic emissions and then a particular states emissions
- establishing damage for slow onset future impacts
- limited understanding of evidence
- case by case rather than holistic approach
- reactive rather than preventative or supportive
- can play a complimentary role to the multilateral regime
What is the issue with sceince in the context of litigation?
evidence submitted and referenced in these cases lags considerably behind state of the art science
- impedes the success of causal claims
- current cases focus on hard to attribute impacts
attriutin is presumed in many cases
What are some key challenges that need to be overcome in this litigation context?
- no authoritive source of how to measure present and future losses and damages from cc
- impacts are localised and intertwined with levels of vulnerability and exposure - hard to measure
- funds and results are required urgently
- the social narrative of the legitimacy of getting compensation from the hisorticl injustices of cc
- idea of the irreversible and the invaluable - loss of culture etc.
