Environmental law
ALTERNATIVE LABELS
Environmental constitutionalism
NARROWER TERMS
Briefing paper
Six reasons to stop* floodplain harvesting in NSW
The NSW Select Committee on Floodplain Harvesting is currently considering the future of how overland flow water in the NSW Murray Darling Basin will be managed and regulated. This briefing note highlights six clear reasons why floodplain harvesting should be limited to the legal volumetric...
Strategy
Regulatory practice statement
The document sets out the Australian Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment's approach to delivering better practice regulation, and a framework to support an improved regulatory capability and culture for the organisation. It will help to strengthen the department’s regulatory functions and achieve regulatory...
Discussion paper
NSW animal welfare reform: discussion paper
This discussion paper outlines the key proposed changes and enhancements to the existing laws. These proposals have been developed to be consistent with the Five Freedoms and Five Domains models of animal welfare, and to reflect best practice in constructing modern legislation.
Report
1200 bridges too far: off-farm water recovery spending in the Murray Darling Basin
This report outlines how money originally allocated to ensure a healthy Murray-Darling Basin is now earmarked to be spent on seemingly unrelated infrastructure in New South Wales. Instead of recovering 450GL promised to the environment in downstream states, this money may now flow to a...
Report
Corporate energy transition: legal tools for shifting companies towards clean energy practices
This research recognises that changes in the energy systems to reduce climate risks cannot be achieved by government policy alone. The private sector and corporations, especially large corporate emitters, have an important role to play.
Report
Muzzling dissent: how corporate influence over politics has fueled anti-protest laws
This report examines anti-protest laws passed or introduced in three American states — Louisiana, Minnesota, and West Virginia — and traces how corporate influence has spurred elected officials to attempt to use those laws to clamp down on opposition during the construction of new, controversial...
Briefing paper
Post-pandemic natural resource management in the Indo-Pacific
The two main threats to natural resource management caused by COVID-19 are the negative impact on ecosystems (and thereby resources) of increased human interaction with the environment, and the increased disregard for international environmental laws, norms and regulations, by both individuals and nations. This paper...
Report
New directions for resource management in New Zealand
New Directions for Resource Management in New Zealand is a comprehensive review of New Zealand’s resource management system.
Briefing paper
Cultural vandalism: regulated destruction of Aboriginal cultural heritage in New South Wales
Aboriginal people in New South Wales have been trying to strengthen the law that is supposed to protect their cultural heritage since the late 1970s, but reform remains elusive. This paper outlines some reasons why.
Report
The growth and complexity of environmental regulation
This report is the first to quantitatively estimate both the growth and complexity of Australia’s primary piece of environmental legislation and the departmental rules it enables.
Policy report
Global trends in climate change litigation: 2019 snapshot
This policy report provides an overview of current issues in climate change litigation, focusing on selected cases and developments from May 2018 to May 2019.
Guide
Global judicial handbook on environmental constitutionalism
This handbook is designed to provide jurists with an overview of environmental constitutionalism: to address what it is, the peculiar practical and procedural issues it presents, and how courts from around the globe have engaged it.
Case study
Compendium of Global Environmental Constitutionalism: selected cases and materials
This document is associated with the Global judicial handbook on environmental constitutionalism. It contains leading cases (edited) and constitutional provisions from around the globe, as well as reference materials, and a selected bibliography.
Report
Environmental rule of law: first global report
The first ever global assessment of environmental rule of law finds weak enforcement to be a global trend that is exacerbating environmental threats, despite prolific growth in environmental laws and agencies worldwide over the last four decades.
Report
Decentralising the protection of Australian threatened species
Environmental law in Australia has not only been expanding but also becoming more centralised. This paper emphasises one aspect of environmental law - the listing and protection of threatened species - and analyses potential reform directions.
Strategy
Blueprint for the next generation of Australian environmental law
This summary presents the key proposals that emerged from APEEL’s efforts to develop a ‘blueprint’ for the nextgeneration of Australian environmental law.
Survey
Reforming the EPA - the impact on communities and the environment
Summary of results from a survey, conducted by Environmental Justice Australia, to feed into reform of the Environment Protection Act and EPA.
Report
Last line of defence: compliance, monitoring and enforcement of New Zealand's environmental law
This report aims to explain the role and importance of enforcing compliance of environmental law in New Zealand.
Report
Transport and environmental regulation of hazardous waste - opportunities for harmonisation
Businesses involved with the movement of hazardous waste typically interact with three core regulatory regimes: work health and safety; transport of dangerous goods; and environmental protection. This report aims to identify and recommend opportunities to achieve greater regulatory harmonisation across regulatory regimes.
Conference paper
Law and governance for the biodiverse city
This paper suggests that Australia’s existing environmental laws and regulations are inadequate to protect biodiversity when it comes in direct competition with determined urban expansion.