Course Overview:

Climate change presents difficult social, environmental and legal challenges. The governance system applying to climate change is complex and multi-level. This module focuses on international and EU law and policy on climate change. It will examine the development of international climate change law and policy since 1989, paying particular attention to the rules, institutions and procedures established pursuant to the 1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), and its 1997 Kyoto Protocol, as well as post-Kyoto developments in climate change governance. It will explore the key EU governance approaches to climate change, especially the emissions trading system (and its interactions with the international regimes) and the difficult legal and policy decisions in different sectors and climate change technologies, such as renewable energy.

At the end of the course participants should have:

• A knowledge of the core areas of law and substantive legal principles of the international and EU response to climate change
• A critical understanding of the different regulatory and policy instruments available, and of the advantages and disadvantages of each.

This course will be taught by Chiara Armeni and Maria Lee. Classes take place on Thursday 9-11.

Teaching and Assessment
This course is taught by seminar discussion. Students are expected to prepare for each class and to contribute to class discussion. Students may write one practice essay during the course, which will be marked and returned. These essays do not form part of the final assessment, but are an essential part of the course. Choose any essay question from the past exam (appended to the end of this handout) and submit max 1500 words to Andrea Ledwig (a.ledwig@ucl.ac.uk) at the Graduate Office by 6 December (mark “to the attention of Ms Chiara Armeni”).
The course is assessed by a two hour examination at the end of the academic year.