The J.B. and Maurice C. Shapiro Distinguished Lecture

The Second Annual J.B. and Maurice C. Shapiro Distinguished Lecture on Global Climate Change and Energy Law

Unlocking CBDR: How National Courts Are Domesticating an Equity Principle of International Environmental Law and Why That Matters for Climate Justice

Thursday, October 26, 2023 | 12:15 pm - 2 pm

Jacob Burns Moot Court Room

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Please join the GW Law Environmental and Energy Law Program for its second annual Shapiro Distinguished Lecture. The lecture celebrates the work and leadership of Professor Arnold Reitze, who, founded GW Law's Environmental and Energy Law Program in 1970 and directed the program until his retirement in 2008. Professor Reitze is the author of seven books and more than 100 research studies and articles on environmental law. His most recent book is Air Pollution Control and Climate Change Mitigation Law (2010). The Shapiro Distinguished Lecture features globally recognized leaders to address pressing issues in climate change and energy law to inform and inspire the GW Law and greater campus community, the Washington, DC legal community, and the global community.

This year's lecture will feature Dr. Patricia Galvão Ferreira, Associate Professor with the Marine & Environmental Law Institute/MELAW at Schulich School of Law, Dalhousie University, in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Her lecture on national courts' growing engagement with the CBDR equity principle in the context of climate litigation will be followed by commentary from two discussants: Dr. Rachael Jonassen and Judge Gabriel Wedy.

Abstract

In the wake of an increase in the quantity and sophistication of climate lawsuits worldwide, a number of national courts are engaging with the equity principle of “common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities” (“CBDR-RC” or “CBDR”) to help determine the scope of countries’ legal obligations to contribute their “fair share” of global mitigation efforts. The importance of understanding whether and how the principle may play a role in defining the scope of state climate obligations led the Foreign Ministers of Chile and Colombia to include, in January 2023, specific questions related to CBDR in their request for an advisory opinion from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACtHR) regarding the Court’s interpretation of state obligations in light of the impacts climate change has on rights protected under the Inter-American Convention on Human Rights (IACHR). How and why are we witnessing CBDR, which was originally conceived as an outward-looking principle (aiming to guide state-to-state negotiations of environmental agreements), gain relevance in climate litigation? The lecture seeks to:

• Examine how courts in the Netherlands, Germany, France, and Australia are finding normative content in both the “common” and “differentiated” elements of CBDR.
• Consider why this “outward-looking” principle is now acquiring an “inward-looking” (obligating the state to take certain action within the domestic legal order) angle; and
• Evaluate the potential consequences of this development in climate litigation as part of the global response to climate change.

The lecture proposes that national courts’ engagement with CBDR in climate litigation is intrinsically linked to the advent of politically agreed global temperature goals (particularly the well below 2 degrees Celsius temperature goal of the Paris Agreement), scientific calculations of remaining global carbon budgets, the concept of “fair shares” of climate burdens, and the disproportionate climate impacts to already vulnerable social groups or countries. It also asserts that the nascent CBDR jurisprudence illustrates both the promise and limitations of invoking a contested principle of international environmental law to help courts play a more active role in responding to the climate crisis.

Speakers

• Dr. Patricia Galvão Ferreira
• Judge Gabriel Wedy
• Dr. Rachael Grace Jonassen

Dr. Patrícia Galvão Ferreira is an Associate Professor with the Marine & Environmental Law Institute at Schulich School of Law, Dalhousie University. Dr. Galvão Ferreira’s research centers on transnational environmental law and justice, with particular interests in international climate law, climate justice, climate finance, and sustainable food systems. She is the co-editor of the 4th edition of the Canadian Environmental Law and Policy Coursebook, published by Emond and author of publications addressing a variety of topics, including international law, international environmental law, climate justice, climate finance, environmental justice, law and development, global governance and human rights. She received her SJD from the University of Toronto Faculty of Law, together with an interdisciplinary doctoral degree in dynamics of global change from the Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy. She holds an LLM in international human rights law from Notre Dame Law School and an LLB from the Federal University of Bahia in Brazil.

Dr. Galvão Ferreira previously served as assistant professor and academic director of the Transnational Environmental Law and Policy Clinic at the University of Windsor Faculty of Law, where she held a joint appointment at the Great Lakes Institute for Environmental Research (GLIER). At GLIER, she worked alongside scientists on the environment and policy interface. At Windsor Law, she was also the co-leader of the Cities and Climate Forum, and board member of the Transnational Law and Racial Justice Network and the Center for Cities. Dr. Galvão Ferreira was a Law Foundation of Ontario Scholar in 2018, and a Postdoctoral Fellow researching international climate law and observing international climate negotiations at the Center for International Governance Innovation (CIGI) from 2015 to 2017. She has also been a visiting scholar at the Center for Latin American Studies at Stanford University and at the FGV Law School in São Paulo.

Dr. Galvao Ferreira’s research and teaching are informed by her two-decade career in non-governmental organizations in the areas of human rights and economic justice, with focus on Latin America (particularly Brazil) and Southern Africa. She currently serves as the chairperson of the Brazil advisory board for the Center for Justice and International Law (CEJIL), where she worked as a human rights lawyer for five years.

Judge Gabriel Wedy is a federal judge, law professor at the University of Vale do Rio dos Sinos (UNISINOS), and environmental law professor at ESMAFE (Superior School of the Federal Magistrature). He holds an LL.M. and PhD in Law from PUCRS (PDSE CAPES Program under the guidance of Professor Michael B. Gerrard of Columbia Law School). Judge Wedy conducted post-doctoral work as a visiting scholar at the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia Law School and at the Universität Heidelberg-Institut für deutsches und europäisches Verwaltungsrecht (Germany). He is a member of the Working Group of the National Council of Justice “Observatory of the Environment and Climate Change of the Judiciary.” Judge Wedy is also a member of the Judging Committee of the National Contest for Environmental Decisions and the Judging Committee of the “Juízo Verde” Award, both of which are offered by the National Council of Justice. A prolific author of books and articles on Climate Change Law in Brazil and abroad, Judge Wedy is also a member of the IUCN World Commission on Environmental Law (WCEL), Vice-President of the “Law for a Green Planet Institute” (Instituto o Direito por um Planeta Verde – IDPV), and former President of the Brazilian Federal Judges Association (AJUFE), from 2010 to 2012, and of the Federal Judges Association of the State of Rio Grande do Sul (AJUFERGS-ESMAFE) from 2008 to 2010.

Rachael Jonassen is the Director of Climate Change and Greenhouse Gas Management programs at the Environmental and Energy Management Institute as well as Associate Research Professor of Urban Sustainability at George Washington University. Her primary appointment is in the Department of Engineering Management and Systems Engineering. She served as Senior Climate Scientist at Logistics Management Institute advising the Obama Administration and New York City on greenhouse gas management and climate impacts after four years at the National Science Foundation (NSF), where she directed Carbon Cycle Science and Biogeoscience research and represented NSF at the Global Change Research Program, leading on international efforts on carbon cycle research and managing the North American Carbon Program. Prior to that appointment, she was Professor of Hydroclimatology where she developed and applied downscaling methods for climate change assessments for hydroelectric systems and biogeographic problems and supported the Department of Energy on high-level nuclear waste long-term storage. She was recognized for her service at NSF with the Director’s Award and is a Fellow of the Geological Society of America. Her work has been featured in eight books, 70+ professional papers, and 150 professional presentations. Jonassen holds a PhD and MS (Geoscience) from Penn State and a BA from Dickinson College. She now serves on multiple advisory groups at the National Academies and advises international climate change mitigation and adaptation with the Asian Development Bank, the World Bank, and the United Nations.

Fall 2022 Shapiro Distinguished Lecture