The carbon-based fossil fuels (chiefly oil, coal, and natural gas) implicated in anthropogenic climate change are sequestered outcomes of millions of years of natural photosynthesis. Many emerging areas of nanotechnology research are focusing on artificial photosynthesis as a long-term planetary renewable energy and carbon management option – by providing an alternative form of energy to both fossil fuels and biofuels and as a means of stabilizing atmospheric CO2. A macroscience Global Artificial Photosynthesis (GAP) Project, by allowing researchers to refine and enhance the process of photosynthesis, has the potential to become a valuable adjunct to or even supplant other bioenergy and biosequestration policy options. This article explores what lessons can be drawn from the governance of contemporary macroscience projects about the ethical and legal principles upon which a GAP project should be organized.

The main point of my submission is that the Territory should avoid damaging its emerging renewable energy sector by prematurely imposing additional limitations on the scope and generosity of the FIT scheme created by the Act, either in the form of installed capacity limits or scheme caps.

Stephens shows that there is more going on in international environmental dispute settlement than even many keen observers of the subject of international environmental law might realise. His book is an impressive blend of not only jurisprudence and analytical insight, but also a realistic nuts and bolts explanation of institutional and systemic frameworks.

The Pulp Mills case is the latest in a series of environmental cases to find its way before the ICJ. Pulp Mills contributes to the development of international environmental law by confirming that that transboundary environmental impact assessment is part and parcel of general international law. It is true that deficiencies remain in connection with the nature, scope and content of the EIA (including public consultation). However, states planning projects that pose risks of significant transboundary environmental harm (or threaten shared natural resources) shoulder a significant obligation of due diligence to ensure the environment or resources are protected from harm.

While climate policy has focused overwhelmingly on the science and on reducing emissions, policy makers are increasingly focused on how to adapt to changes are already “locked in”, changes that will bring significant social economic and environmental impacts. Adaptation will require technological innovation as well as behavioural and attitudinal change. This book covers the legal dimensions of adaptation and addresses challenges across sector interests. It considers whether existing regulatory and governance frameworks are supportive, adaptable or barriers to necessary change. The authors cover the key issues: sea level rise, planning; water security; climate justice; conservation regimes; the role of the courts; insurance; compensation; and the law of disasters.

This chapter describes ACT laws which require action towards improved environmental sustainability. It examines provisions to reduce carbon emissions and energy use, improve energy, transport and water efficiency, and requirements to consider the environment in decision making.

The Chapter covers Planning and Development Act 2007 (ACT), Environment Protection Act 1997, Electricity (National Scheme) Act 1997, Utilities Act 2000, Weathering the Change: the ACT Climate Change Strategy 2007-2025, ACT Electricity (Greenhouse Gas Emissions) Act 2004, Uranium Mining and Nuclear Facilities (Prohibitions) Act 1986 (NSW), Electricity Feed-in (Renewable Energy Premium) Act 2008, Solar access law, sustainability provisions in ACT Planning Law, Energy efficiency law including the Building Act 2004, Energy Star Ratings including Nationwide House Energy Rating Scheme, Building Sustainability Index (BASIX), energy efficiency performance ratings (EER) including EER and rental properties, Efficiency of Appliances. The Chapter also covers Planning law as it relates to urban water issues including Catchment protection, Water tanks, Water Efficiency and Labelling Standards (WELS).

The Chapter concludes by arguing that the ACT has a number of provisions scattered throughout the statute book which address the question of environmental sustainability, primarily through energy ratings, water efficiency measures and planning controls. However the extent to which these provisions might be said to provide a ‘best practice’ systematic and integrated framework for the attainment of improved levels of sustainability is certainly debateable. There is no overarching climate change response legislation, nor is there an overarching Sustainability Act which might require government decisions across portfolios to be made having regard to the principles of ESD.

This article provides a critique of a paper by Gerard Early on the operation of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (Cth) (EPBC Act). Early’s article presents the EPBC Act as world best practice environmental impact assessment (EIA) legislation and argues that it has produced significant improvements in environmental outcomes. The evidence suggests otherwise. The EPBC Act is deficient in a number of respects, particularly in relation to the structure of the EIA regime and listing processes concerning threatened biodiversity and heritage areas. This article outlines defects in Early’s analysis and in the EPBC Act more generally.

The Garnaut Climate Change Review was the most comprehensive government inquiry into climate change that has ever been conducted in Australia. The Final Report of the Review was published in late September 2008 and contains an extensive list of recommendations on adaptation and abatement policy options. Most controversially, the Review argues that Australia’s climate response should be built around gaining an international consensus on stabilising the atmospheric concentration of greenhouse gases at 550 parts per million (ppm) of carbon dioxide equivalents (CO2-e). While arguing that a lower stabilisation target of “450 ppm or less” would better suit Australia’s interests, the Review concludes that anything significantly below 550 ppm is politically unrealistic. If there is a global agreement to pursue a 550 ppm outcome, the Review argues that Australia’s mid- and long-term targets should be to reduce emissions net of international trading by 10 per cent from 2000 levels by 2020, and 80 per cent by 2050. This article provides a critique of the Review’s mitigation recommendations, focusing on whether the proposed global and national targets are likely to lead to a 550 ppm outcome. It concludes that the international community, and especially Australia and other developed countries, should adopt abatement targets in excess of those proposed by the Review if there is a desire to keep the atmospheric concentration of greenhouse gases to 550 ppm.

The recent bushfires in Victoria, which took over 200 lives, paradoxically may have highlighted a positive aspect of Aboriginal culture highly relevant to concerns about the sustainability of global human society. Indigenous Australians, finding joy in few wants and a philosophy of the eternal perpetually resonating in the present (rather than some past Eden or future heaven), were able to continuously inhabit their harsh continent for over 10,000 years. They did so with an acute understanding of how to continuously adapt to achieve a balance between population, production and their impingement on the capacity of nature to deliver necessary ecosystem services indefinitely. This included a profound knowledge of how to live with frequent forest (bush) fires.

As global warming and adverse climate change (driven in large part by the needs of contemporary consumerist society) create unprecedented high temperatures and drought conditions over southern Australia (and increasing incidences of such deadly bushfires), it appears that our present industrialised civilisation may soon be at long odds to remain intact on the same land for a mere 500 years. Contemporary concerns about global social sustainability, in other words, create a further important reason why Aboriginal voices and perspectives should be expressed and heard.