The Siren Sounds for Nitrogen

April 2008
Citation:
38
ELR 10253
Issue
4
Author
Jeremy S. Scholtes

Editors' Summary: The international community is intensifying its efforts to combat nitrogen pollution, a threat to human health and the environment. In this Article, Jeremy S. Scholtes examines the nature of this type of pollution and the legal instruments currently in place that deal with it. He begins by explaining the theoretical concerns that negotiators must consider when designing legal instruments, recommending that regional hard law instruments in concert with partnership coordination platforms are the most effective tools for addressing nitrogen pollution. He concludes that the 1979 Convention on LongRange Transboundary Air Pollution (LRTAP) should be used as the model for developing additional regional air pollution regimes around the globe to address nitrogen pollution. Finally, he asserts that an additional benefit of negotiating regional multilateral environmental agreements modeled after LRTAP is that the comprehensive regional programs could be used to implement applicable provisions of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Kyoto Protocol.

Jeremy S. Scholtes is a third-year law student at the University of Maryland School of Law. He thanks Profs. Anne Berns and David Gravallese at the University of Maryland School of Law for providing substantive feedback and encouragement on multiple occasions. The idea for the title of this Article came from the explanation of how and why Siren was selected as the name for the Regional Seas newsletter. See Regional Seas, United Nations Environment Programme, The Siren, http://www.unep.ch/regional seas/main/hsiren.html (last visited Feb. 22, 2008).
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