Principles of international environmental protection - Introduction to International Environmental Law - page 126

of environmental protection. The best-known ones are regulation by
'command and control' and 'economic regulation'.
Examples of the command and control method include the setting of emis-
sion limits or structural requirements for products. The government controls
the behaviour of individuals and businesses and its administrative bodies super-
vise compliance with the rules. This method of environmental protection is
still prevalent but it is being challenged for several reasons, including the diffi -
culties of exercising control: it requires an enormous amount of bureaucracy
and fi nancial resources.
Economic regulation (emissions trading, for example) infl uences the
market so that it becomes more profi table for a company to select environ-
mentally friendly decisions from the available alternatives. Economic regula-
tion is increasing in international environmental law, although the
governmental command and control method is clearly more common. This
is partly due to the nature of international environmental law: many of the
treaties allow national governments to decide how they will implement
the obligations.
The MARPOL treaty system, discussed above, is an example of the
command and control method - and of how the international community is
able to design more effi cient methods for environmental protection. Its
objective is to reduce contamination of the sea, caused by the routine
operations of ships or by accidents. Its Annex I aims to reduce oil emissions
from ships; it includes absolute prohibitions (such as that no oil must be
discharged near the coast) and limitations and requirements related to the
construction of vessels. The focus of regulation is gradually shifting to the struc-
tural requirements. This is understandable, since it is very diffi cult to control
whether a certain vessel has discharged oil contrary to Annex I or violated
its regulations in other ways.
In 1989, the Exxon Valdez oil tanker caused an enormous crude oil
discharge of between 260,000 and 750,000 barrels, contaminating about 2,100
kilometres of the Alaskan coast. After the catastrophe, the International
Maritime Organization (IMO) pursued the claim that oil tankers should be
required to have double hulls to reduce the risk of oil leak. The Exxon Valdez
did not have a double hull.
There is reason to conclude that regulation requiring double hulls in exist-
ing and especially in new oil tankers, would be a more effi cient regulation
instrument than emission limits: as the vessels are better constructed, oil
hazards are effi ciently reduced.
Economic regulation is gradually emerging in international environmen-
tal law as well. The most prominent example is the Kyoto Protocol to the
UN Convention on Climate Change. It obligates the industrial nations
listed in Annex I to cut their total emissions by an average of 5 per cent
below the levels recorded in 1990 within the time period 2008 to 2012 (the
fi rst commitment period); the second commitment period runs from 2013
to 2020.