Enacting and developing international environmental law - Introduction to International Environmental Law - page 60

under the auspices of the UN Economic Commission for Europe; it contains
several protocols that regulate various harmful substances (see Chapter 4 , 'Long-
range transboundary air pollution', pp. 116).
Another example is an agreement with loose clauses that comprehensively
regulate an environmental threat. The Convention on Biological Diversity actu-
ally only provides a basis for closer regulation. It has therefore been supplemented
by soft-law decisions of the meetings of the parties, and, in the case of crucial
issues, by protocols constituting separate agreements that are linked in many ways
with the parent agreement.
The regime theory helped scholars of international environmental law under-
stand and sustain the image of environmental treaties as constantly changing
bodies of rules. This was signifi cant because as environmental problems change
and scientifi c discovery becomes more sophisticated, so too the management
regime must evolve. Classical international law did not provide the tools for this
kind of evolution. It categorizes international agreements as rules as fi xed and
immutable as they were when they were agreed and adopted by the negotiating
states; they are to be interpreted primarily according to their wording at the time
of the conclusion of the treaty. 17
Innovative environmental regimes
International environmental regimes have gradually developed their own ways
of reacting to regional and global environmental problems. Earlier regulatory
errors have contributed to our experience and understanding, and interna-
tional environmental law has been able to create innovative environmental
regimes that embrace the signifi cance of environmental scientifi c research.
An essential problem in international environmental regulation - and in
regulation generally - is that often measures are only taken after a catastrophe
has occurred, commanding the attention of decision-makers. One of the best-
known examples is that of the sinking of the Titanic when it collided with an
iceberg in the North Atlantic Ocean on 14 April 1912. The disaster resulted
in an international negotiation process and the adoption of the SOLAS
Convention (Safety of Life at Sea, predecessor of the current IMO Convention)
in 1914. Oil tanker disasters are also classic examples that have provided a great
incentive to regulate, in many cases having been quickly followed by a related
environmental treaty. The Chernobyl nuclear plant disaster was followed
almost immediately by two treaties establishing ways in which states can coop-
erate with each other and with the International Atomic Energy Authority
(IAEA) to reduce damage from nuclear power plant disasters.
Most of the modern challenges in environmental protection are not posed by
dramatic, isolated events but are related to environmental problems that have
evolved gradually over time. In these cases, it is much more diffi cult to build
the necessary momentum to regulate than in the aftermath of a catastrophe. One