This timely book brings clarity to the debate on the new legal phenomenon of environmental border tax adjustments. It will help form a better understanding of the role and limits these taxes have on environmental policies in combating global environmental challenges, such as climate change.

Carbon-Related Border Adjustment and WTO Law will be of great benefit to policymakers and practitioners working in the area of climate policy and trade regulation. Researchers and advanced students in international economic law and international enviro

The article addresses border tax adjustment from the perspective of world trade law. This classical instrument of foreign trade provides a level playing field for certain goods by adjusting the indirect taxes and charges to the level of the destination country. Particular problems have arisen with environmental charges. The structure of the article reflects the development of the scientific debate on border tax adjustments. The controversy of the nineties was about the adjustment of environmental taxes, which do not charge a product as such but the resources exhausted in the process of production. The article demonstrates that those taxes are to be numbered among the adjustable indirect taxes. The current debate deals with the expenses European producers have to bear due to the European Emission Trading Scheme. It is demonstrated that those expenses are in the same way adjustable as regular environmental taxes. Thus border tax adjustment on its own becomes important as an instrument of environmental policies. This is because environmental charges can only have an effect on the exhaustion of global resources, if they do not affect global competition in favour for countries that do not pursue environmental policies. Though, in adherence to the Most Favoured Nation Clause adjustments for environmental charges can only be made schematically without considering the environmental policy or the stage of development in the country of origin. However, a justification pursuant to Art. XX GATT would allow a more flexible application of border tax adjustments.

In Climate Border Adjustments and WTO Law, Ulrike Will develops a convincing reform proposal for a climate border adjustment (BA) on imports within the EU Emission Trading System (ETS), which would be immune to disputes at the WTO and comply with international climate agreements while remaining economically feasible and straightforward to implement.

In recent decades environmental protection and more generally global warming have attracted great political concern. In this respect taxes can be some valid governmental tools to pursue specific environmental purposes, as well as to create incentives to change unsustainable patterns of production and consumption into "green" ones. This paper first discusses about the role that taxes can play as a political instrument to stimulate responsible behaviours and illustrates some internationally shared principles regarding environmental policies. Then it provides for a definition of "Border Tax Adjustments" ("BTA") in order to focus on whether the application of BTA with a view to implement some friendly-environment policies may be in contravention with international trade law, as provided for in the GATT. The analysis concludes that even if BTA are generally admitted, under the destination principle, in the WTO context, there still remain some difficult issues to be solved. Adjustments imposed by States in order to pursue environmental goals should comply with all the requirements set forth in the GATT, but the lack of clear definitions and the case-by-case approach taken by the WTO case-law cannot give a clear answer to the question as to whether BTA for environmental purposes are consistent with international trade law. A solution to the problem might therefore reside in a case-by-case approach, in a broader international cooperation and in more enhanced market solutions (i.e. consumers should prefer environmental-friendly products to polluting ones).

Energy and Environmental Law and Policy Series #41 We know the science of climate change; we know the economics of climate change; we also know the law of climate change. However, we do not know how countries may come together to cooperate on climate change mitigation. In this connection, the role of international trade in climate change, although universally acknowledged, is not well understood. This groundbreaking book by one of the world’s foremost authorities on international economic law not only investigates this role in great depth, but also explains how free trade agreements can be used as a powerful tool to help mitigate climate change. Focusing on the idea of climate clubs—namely the coalition of the willing—among governments, companies, and/or international institutions, the book offers insightful analysis on aspects of the trade–climate linkage such as: formation of climate clubs; legitimacy and accountability; technological cooperation; green patents; how competition law hinders effective cooperation between companies seeking to produce sustainable goods; domestic policy preferences; recognizing States that should legitimately be allowed to be free riders; and sanctions for noncompliance. Three detailed case studies are included: a comparison of the U.S. and European Union (EU) Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) programs, energy security in the Arab world, and EU–Russia energy trade relations. With the author’s conviction that global access to energy, mitigating climate change, and benefit from international trade and investment all can be achieved, this book offers a fresh understanding of the international trading system as a way to reach a prosperous, modern, and sustainable society that will help decarbonize the economy effectively. It will be welcomed by all professionals and policymakers concerned with climate change mitigation, and particularly by those active at its nexus with international trade.