Case Studies of Energy Transition Cases

Unofficial AI-generated summary based on the public title and abstract. Not an official translation.

🔬研究者:Provides a comprehensive analysis of ISDS cases in energy, useful for understanding legal barriers to transition.

🏢実務担当者:Highlights potential dispute risks in energy investments, informing due diligence and contract design.

🏛政策担当者:Offers insights on how regulatory changes can trigger ISDS claims, guiding policy design to minimize disputes.

Chapter 11 is written by Filip Balcerzak and is titled “Case Studies of Energy Transition Cases”. The author provides a case study of energy transition cases, starting from observing that almost 27% of all publicly available investor–State arbitrations relate to the energy sector. The author notes that this makes the energy sector the most relevant economic sector for ISDS. The author notes that it is against this reality that the negative public perception that investor–State dispute settlement (ISDS) serves as an obstacle to energy transition and to the fight against climate change is rooted. This chapter expertly discusses the relevance of ISDS in energy transition by looking at various energy sectors – i.e. renewable, nuclear, and fossil fuels. The author does so primarily by a thorough and rich analysis of when and to what extent host States have relied on ‘environmental-based defenses’ during ISDS matters. The chapter analyses the renewable energy ISDS matters by investigating the developments in various States vis-à-vis regulatory changes in the energy sector – e.g. in Spain, Germany, the Czech Republic, Romania, Honduras, Italy, etc. The chapter illustrates the issues by real-life examples from the ISDS shop floor, looking at the issues with, inter alia , coal phase-outs, clawback of feed-in tariffs, revoking licenses, etc. The author concludes that international investment treaties do not constitute an obstacle to energy transition. As pertains to renewable energy investments, the author underscores the obvious fact that critiques often seem to forget, namely, that ‘the cases within this group result from disputes concerning investments without which energy transition would be impossible’. As regards ISDS in nuclear and fossil fuel, the author notes that there may indeed be a perception that it serves as an obstacle to the energy transition process. Meanwhile, the author notes that, to date, there has not been a single ISDS case in which restitution has been awarded. Thus, the real question is: ‘who should bear the financial burden of the energy transition?’ The answer to this question is heavily fact dependent, including considerations of legitimate State defenses rooted in energy transition law.

• openalex https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003536567-13first seen 2026-08-10 04:43:36