IDDRI Sets Out Legal Challenges in Marine Energy Sector

The Institute for Sustainable Development and International Relations (IDDRI), a non-profit policy research institute based in Paris, has published a short analysis of key legal issues and challenges in marine energy sector. 

The paper identifies key legal challenges related to the development of marine energy: international law, environmental impacts, property rights, authorization process, resource management and marine areas.

IDDRI has set out key points:

• Ocean energy is bringing unique challenges to marine governance frameworks, with legal and regulatory issues frequently cited as a major non-technical barrier to development.
• By requiring exclusive occupation of ocean space, ocean energy is effectively privatising a common good and creating potential for conflict with other rights-holders and existing marine users.
• Uncertainties regarding the environmental interactions of ocean energy devices must be better accommodated in regulatory processes, based on adaptive and risk-based management strategies.
• Marine Spatial Planning has rapidly developed as a tool for managing ocean spaces, though it is not yet clear how ocean energy, and other new marine industries, can be integrated into these processes.

“The challenges identified in this Issue Brief present a call to action for development of appropriate governance structures for ocean energy technologies. Understanding and addressing the legal challenges will be a major factor in determining whether ocean energy becomes a successful and sustainable commercial-scale industry,” IDDRI has written in the concusion.

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