Energy & environment

Most investor-state disputes (ISDS) have concerned environmental matters. Corporations are using the ISDS system found in trade and investment agreements to challenge environmental policies. As of end of 2019, 41% of all ICSID cases were energy and natural resources-related.

Most well-known cases include:

• Lone Pine Resources (US) vs. Canada: the investor challenged Quebec’s moratorium on the controversial practice of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, for natural gas. The provincial government declared the moratorium in 2011 so as to conduct an environmental impact assessment of the extraction method widely accused of leaching chemicals and gases into groundwater and the air. Case pending (NAFTA invoked).

• Bilcon (US) vs. Canada: the US industry challenged Canadian environmental requirements affecting their plans to open a basalt quarry and a marine terminal in Nova Scotia. In 2015 the ISDS tribunal decided that the government’s decision hindered the investors’ expectations. Bilcon won and received US$7 million in damages, plus interest (NAFTA invoked).

• Vattenfall (Sweden) vs. Germany: in 2007 the Swedish energy corporation was granted a provisional permit to build a coal-fired power plant near the city of Hamburg. In an effort to protect the Elbe river from the waste waters dumped from the plant, environmental restrictions were added before the final approval of its construction. The investor initiated a dispute, arguing it would make the project unviable. The case was ultimately settled in 2011, with the city of Hamburg agreeing to the lowering of environmental standards (ECT invoked).

Photo: Kris Krug / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

(March 2020)

Entorno Inteligente | 18-Aug-2017
La estatal Petróleos de Venezuela (Pdvsa) informó que actuará para proteger sus activos en Estados Unidos, tras la solicitud de embargo que hizo la minera canadiense Crystallex ante una corte de ese país por una disputa que arrastran ambas empresas desde hace años.
Latin America Herald Tribune | 15-Aug-2017
Crystallex — owed $1.4 billion for the expropriation of its Venezuela mining subsidiary — has moved U.S. Federal Court in Delaware to seize Petroleos de Venezuela Holding, the parent company of PDVSA’s American unit Citgo Holding.
Le Devoir | 12-Aug-2017
Québec était en droit d’instituer un moratoire sur la fracturation hydraulique et Ottawa ne devrait pas compenser Lone Pine.
La República | 9-Aug-2017
El representante de Odebrecht en Perú, Mauricio Cruz, advirtió que la constructora recurrirá a un arbitraje internacional si se pospone la venta de sus acciones en el proyecto Gasoducto Sur Peruano que, en su opinión, debe concretarse en enero de 2018.
SSRN | 4-Aug-2017
The Bilcon tribunal ruling raises a number of concerns about the ability of investor protection tribunals to properly assess whether a foreign investor has been treated fairly under a domestic environmental assessment process.
Business Monkey | 3-Aug-2017
The Government of Spain has submitted to international arbitration tribunal ICSID appeal against the ruling which condemned him to pay 128 million euros plus interest to the British firm Eiser Infrastructure.
CIAR Global | 2-Aug-2017
España busca la anulación del laudo del arbitraje iniciado por Eiser Infrastructure Limited y Energía Solar Luxembourg que le condena a una indemnización de 128 millones de euros por las subvenciones energéticas.
Intercontinental Cry | 27-Jul-2017
This past month, eighteen Aymara community leaders endured the final stages of a trial that had them facing up to 28 years in prison and massive fines for their alleged roles in the 2011 ‘Aymarazo’ protests against the Santa Ana silver mine on the Peru-Bolivia border.
Lexology | 26-Jul-2017
One should be cautious with jumping to conclusions for the still pending Spanish ECT cases.
Montevideo Portal | 25-Jul-2017
Los inversores de la minera Aratirí notificaron al presidente Tabaré Vázquez sobre el inicio de una demanda millonaria contra el Estado uruguayo por "dañar" su inversión, según informa hoy el semanario Búsqueda.