Research Tool for Assessing International Energy Agreements

Energy, money, power...

Each creates opportunities. Each is dependent on the other. Each comes with a high potential for corruption.

Because cutting oil imports is a global challenge, the need for strong laws and international treaties is critically important. Fashioning legal agreements that facilitate opportunity, secure investment, protect patents, and reduce coruption, while safeguarding the environment is no easy feat - but a new online resource will help legal scholars analyze and draft new legal instruments that will pave the way for international cooperation.

The Energy & Environmental Security Initiative (EESI) is an interdisciplinary center located at the University of Colordo. They have released an online database collection of international treaties called the International Sustainable Energy Assessment (ISEA) which is a goldmine of information for policy makers, entrepreneurs, legislators, lobbyists, investors, and energy business consultants alike. As they say...

By providing information on the implementation and impacts of international energy agreements, as well as analysis regarding the efficacy such agreements in achieving their stated goals, the ISEA database will provide the information essential to distilling objectives, principles, cooperative frameworks, institutional structures, dispute settlement mechanisms, implementing machinery, and financing mechanisms capable of facilitating the development, deployment and diffusion of renewable energy, energy efficiency and energy conservation. This information is essential to helping integrate the principles of sustainable development into country policies and programs through the medium of international agreements.

The analysis of each treaty is designed to be broader than that available from other existing services. It will include global scope, international energy agreements, implementation data, REES Impact Analysis, and full searchable text of each document.

The resource is deployed with two levels of accessibility. An internal "holding bin" is accessible by password. After a treaty has been thoroughly researched, analyzed, and categorized then it is made accessible to the general public.

At right is the current (7/11/06) listing of the publicly accessible main categories and the number of documents associated with each. Those interested in Bioenergy treaties, for instance, would look under Sustainable Energy (SE) - 151, subcategory Renewable Energy (RE) - 97, subcategory Bioenergy (BE) - 1.

This resource provides significant value for corporate legal team research efforts in support of global business development. It simultaneously provides insight into current policies and restraints, while providing comparison and justification for interested parties to create, refine, and lobby for new ones.

Longterm, the ISEA database will expand to include resolutions, declarations and partnerships.


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