Accelerating Permit Issuances for Renewable Energy Projects

Asian economies are often characterized as having bank-dominated financial systems and underdeveloped capital markets, in particular with regard to venture capital. In economies that banks are the main source of funding, the main obstacle for financing infrastructural projects including renewable energy (RE) projects is lack of access to long-term finance. The second obstacle for development of RE energy projects is their lower rate of return comparing to fossil fuel projects as more subsidies are globally going to fossil fuels. For larger RE projects insurance and pensions are sustainable financing alternatives. Pension funds and insurance companies hold long-term savings, so these institutions could be a proper alternative for financing mega-size RE projects. In addition, utilizing the spillover effects originally created by energy supplies in form of tax revenues refund to RE projects will increase their rate of return and make them interesting for private investors. For smaller-size RE projects, the paper provides a theoretical model for combining utilisation of carbon tax and a new way of financing risky capital, i.e., Hometown Investment Trust Funds (HITs). The paper theoretically shows that by environmental taxation and allocating these tax revenues to HITs, RE projects will become more feasible and more interesting for private investors; hence the supply of investment money to these funds will increase.

Comparative Administrative Law and Public Administration

Global and European Constraints Upon National Right to Regulate: The Services Sector

The paper presents the author’s view of the problem of interaction between international and national administrative law and attempts to determine the place of the Convention on the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms in the Russian legal system and the administrative and tort legislation of the country. Based on the analysis of different points of view, the conclusion is enunciated that international treaties ratified by the Russian Federation are incorporated into the general body of administrative legislation; and they constitute a source of administrative law in the part in which they contain legal provisions governing the administrative and legal status of citizens, as well as guarantees of its implementation, including guarantees of equitable justice in cases arising from public law relations and administrative and tort cases. In this regards, the author analyzes the provisions of Article 1.1 of the Administrative Code of the Russian Federation, determining the place and role of universally recognized principles and norms of international law and international treaties of the Russian Federation in the system of sources of administrative and tort law—the author refers the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms to the sources mentioned above. The paper considers this Convention as an international treaty of the Russian Federation that not only regulates interstate relations, but also actively invades the regulation of procedural administrative responsibility, since it establishes the general parameters of a fair trial in administrative and tort cases. The paper also pays attention to the implementation in the draft Code of Administrative Offences of the Russian Federation and the Procedural Code of the Russian Federation on Administrative Offences of the Constitutional Principle concerning international legal norms in the legal system of the Russian Federation.

This article examines the legal issues relating to the State Administrators’ enforcement of policies, rules, and decision-making in Malaysia and Indonesia during the pandemic from the perspective of administrative law. The State Administrators have come out with various Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) that impacted the people. It is argued that administrative law can discern potential abuse by State administrators while enforcing the law. This article will examine the enforcement issues in both nations by utilizing doctrinal and comparative analysis. Consequently, some exercise of discretion of the executive can be questioned and challenged under the purview of administrative law. Keywords: Administrative law, law enforcement, administrative discretion; Covid-19 eISSN: 2398-4287 © 2020. The Authors. Published for AMER ABRA cE-Bs by e-International Publishing House, Ltd., UK. This is an open access article under the CC BYNC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer–review under responsibility of AMER (Association of Malaysian Environment-Behaviour Researchers), ABRA (Association of Behavioural Researchers on Asians) and cE-Bs (Centre for Environment-Behaviour Studies), Faculty of Architecture, Planning & Surveying, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Malaysia. DOI: https://doi.org/10.21834/ebpj.v6iSI6.3052

The construction of civil service legal system is an important element of civil service management, and strengthening the onstruction of civil service legal system is an objective requirement for maintaining the advanced nature of the Party is a practical need to consolidate the party’s ruling base, is the problem of style itself stubborn and recurring requirements. It is the key to cope with the complex international competition and build a moderately prosperous society. In the new era, China,s civil service legal system construction mainly takes measures in three aspects: First, strengthen the ideological education and lay a firm ideological foundation for the construction of the civil service legal system. The second is to improve the institutional mechanism to ensure the standard operation of the civil service legal construction of the fundamental; third is to strengthen supervision and inspection to ensure that the civil service legal construction of the key to achieve effective results. Based on this, this paper considers the strategies and directions of the legal construction of civil service based on data fusion under the perspective of administrative law, and combines case studies to demonstrate the effectiveness and superiority of the proposed scheme.

The EU Services Directive (SD) is a centrepiece for the realisation of the Internal Market in the services sector aiming at considerably lowering the barriers for service provision in the EU. This chapter therefore analyses the transposition and implementation of the requirements of the SD into the national (administrative) law system of Estonia. This chapter treats all relevant requirements of the SD, such as the Point of Single Contact (POSC), the screening of national law according to the requirements of the SD, the adaption of authorisation schemes for service provision, the requirement of ‘tacit authorisation’, and the need for new rules on administrative cooperation. Finally an assessment of the impact of the SD on the national (administrative) law system is provided.KeywordsSingle Point Of Contact (POSC)Tacit AuthorisationAdministrative CooperationDomestic Service ProvidersSimple NotificationThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.

The deferred prosecution agreement system, which originated in the United States, is gradually accepted by Britain, France, Canada, Australia and other countries, and is regarded as an important way to deal with corporate crime cases. Taking the development of deferred prosecution agreement system as a lesson, it is of great significance to improve the system of unit criminal responsibility in China, which will change the judicial practice that China pays attention to individual crimes and ignores unit crimes, promote the popularization and maturity of corporate compliance program, and effectively prevent and punish unit crimes. Under the influence of COVID-19 epidemic, the urgent need to restore economic development and strengthen special protection for private enterprises and entrepreneurs has become a criminal justice concept generally accepted by judicial organs in China. This paper discusses the influence of deferred prosecution agreement system on the construction of corporate compliance program and puts forward the construction ideas for the specific content of deferred prosecution system in China, including the applicable object, applicable conditions, compliance inspection and the specific setting of deferred prosecution procedures. Although the focus of this paper is to study the impact of the deferred prosecution agreement system embedded in China's criminal proceedings on the construction of corporate compliance program in China, however Nowadays corporate compliance involves and has already extends beyond criminal law to include administrative law, civil law, industry rules and business ethics. Therefore, this paper also calls for attention from other perspectives from the perspective, i.e., from the perspective of administrative law, there is also great value in establishing a reduction, exemption and deferred punishment system for enterprises who violate laws. We must propose solutions with Chinese characteristics according to China's national conditions and status and help Chinese enterprises to build corporate compliance plans and programs.

A digital administration requires new forms of cooperation. The work focuses on administrative networks as a form of organisation and shows legal possibilities of implementation through administrative networks on the basis of the "Onlinezugangsgesetz" (Online Access Act). Networks are analysed from the perspective of administrative law, taking into account the constitutional framework. The network characteristics identified are applied to the cooperation for im-plenting the Online Access Act and legal options for action are examined. Thus, the work is aimed at administrative law scholars with a focus on digital administration as well as representatives from federal, state and local administration.

Renewable energy (RE) projects are increasingly contested. We present bio- and wind energy projects in Argentina, Mexico, and Nicaragua with reference to different frameworks of justice. We bridge the concept of energy justice with insights from climate change and climate justice research and argue that the social groups facing energy injustices related to the implementation of RE projects face a situation of ‘triple inequalities of decarbonisation policies’: they are negatively affected by climate change although, from a global and historical perspective, they have not contributed much to it, and now face injustices related to the mitigation of climate change. We underscore this argument by presenting cases of wind energy generation and biomass production for fuel. We conclude that relating different strands of justice debates with a historically grounded analysis of triple inequalities can imply the denial of RE projects by actors who belong to marginalised groups – despite of a global urgency of decarbonisation.

The number of renewable energy (RE) projects that have been implemented in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) has soared over the past couple of years. The number of projects to be implemented within the coming years is expected to rise considerably. However, the societal benefits of RE projects implemented in SSA have not been studied thoroughly. This study attempts to: (i) uncover the differences between the expected and the realized societal benefits of utilizing renewable energy technologies (RETs) in SSA, (ii) reveal any empirical failures in realizing those benefits and (iii) create awareness towards the sustainable implementation of RE projects. Within the realm of publicly-funded projects, we aim to provide solutions that assist these and future projects to meet their societal benefits. We investigate 29 projects that have been implemented in ten SSA countries taking into account direct experiences of the local users and project developers. We find that most of the projects investigated in this study have few to no societal benefits within a short period of time after the “cutting the ribbon” event. To counteract this, we present corresponding recommendations.

Today, there is a lot of focus on using renewable energy sources to address climate change and achieve sustainable development goals. This paper investigates the non-linear relationship between financial development (FIDI), economic complexity (EC), R&D investment as a control variable on renewable energy transition. FIDI’s vital role in facilitating investment in renewable energy (RE) projects has been identified. To reduce the cost of RE projects and attract more investors. Developed financial systems facilitate RE deployment by providing access to diverse financing mechanisms, such as green bonds and project finance. This is evident in countries like Australia, where a robust financial sector has supported substantial investments in solar and wind energy projects. This research investigates the nonlinear effects of FIDI on renewable energy use. It can be acknowledged that economic complexity, which is evaluated by the diversity and complexity of a country’s export products, affects the adoption of RE technologies. Can countries with higher ECs that tend to develop more advanced industrial capabilities and know-how support the development of RE solutions? On the other hand, another factor that makes use of RE is investment in research and development. Research and innovation in clean energy technologies will drive down costs, improve productivity, and produce new developments that can make RE competitive with fossil fuels. Countries investing in RE research and development have faster adoption rates and greater market penetration. Data from OECD countries in the years 2000 to 2022 show that, at the 5% confidence level, the use of RE follows a U-shaped curve with respect to financial development (using quadratic regression analysis, both the coefficients of the linear and square terms are statistically significant. These findings confirm a U-shaped relationship between FIDI and RE). Our results suggest that the increase in economic complexity may deter, at an initial stage, the transition toward renewable energy, but it can indeed be substantially expedited through strategic R&D investments. Therefore, we recommend that policymakers should invest in infrastructure that secures diversification in the energy sector and lowers adverse complexity effects and massively increase public funding for renewable energy R&D, stimulate private–public partnerships in this regard, and establish very clear rules and regulations to maximize innovation effects in renewable energy deployment. These would be critical steps in rapidly achieving a low-carbon economy and realizing sustainable development goals.

This contextual paper tackles a rather under-researched topic of Council of Europe’s possible impact on national administrative law. It seeks to examine how one of its instruments – Recommendations of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe – can influence national standards of administrative law and provide a systematic assessment of the diverse functions and manifestations such instruments might have in a national legal order. For these purposes, the constitutional basis of these recommendations and their main features are examined followed by a subsequent analysis of the perceived importance and various functions and implications they might have in the chosen national legal system. This paper concludes that the scope of the functions and implications these instruments are capable of having to national administrative law is wide, yet it is not without limitations.

The target of 20 per cent for the overall share of energy from renewable sources in the European Union by 2020, and the need for a further increase of renewable energy consumption towards 2030 call for a major transformation in society. Above and beyond the technological challenges such as developing efficient renewable energy generation, improving the grid – particularly with regard to incorporating volatile energy sources – and developing storage techniques for temporary renewable energy surplus, a string of societal and, more specifically, legal challenges need to be explored. The chapters of this book have focused on legal aspects of the transition towards renewable energy, specifically exploring new questions from regional government perspectives. Part of this legal exploration includes the legal aspects of the role of finance, both in terms of supporting renewable energy and of engaging local involvement. Another major part addresses the competences of, and decision-making by regional governments. This concluding chapter aims to bridge the findings of the contributing authors and provides overarching observations. We construct our findings around three main themes: • the relevance of the EU legal renewable energy framework for regional governments (Section 2); • legal aspects of finance (Section 3), firstly with attention to support mechanisms (Section 3.1), and then to potential paths for financial participation by citizens and local communities in renewable energy projects (Section 3.2); and • the authorization of renewable energy projects (Section 4). Section 5 concludes the book.

There is an acute electricity shortage in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), and electricity blackouts are common. Climate change and carbon dioxide gas emissions from conventional power-generating systems are also of great concern. Africa has vast renewable energy resources, including hydropower, solar, wind, biomass and geothermal, which are relatively unexploited. However, there is currently a knowledge gap on how renewable energy projects can be derisked to increase the flow of international private capital into them. Based on a literature review, this study aims to identify the risk factors that hinder investment in renewable energy development in SSA. The review finds that barriers to renewable energy development include fragmented electricity markets, utilities with poor balance sheets and low credit ratings, high energy transmission losses, political risks, high initial capital costs, poorly directed subsidies, insufficiently developed money markets, and a poor regulatory framework. Efficient risk mitigation strategies are proposed. The study also finds that the global utility-scale levelized costs of electricity from renewable energy resources compare favourably with those of conventional sources. Countries in SSA need to draw up a clear policy framework with legally binding targets for the contribution of renewable energy to the energy supply portfolio. In addition, subsidies currently enjoyed by conventional energy generators need to be restructured to target low-income groups. SSA countries should identify pipelines of suitable renewable energy projects, complete feasibility studies and invite potential developers. Risks faced by international investors in renewable energy projects, including political, commercial and financial risks, are insurable. SSA faces a large infrastructure financing gap. Closing this financing gap requires building efficient local capital markets to mobilise domestic savings, reduce the costs of capital for renewable energy projects, and reduce reliance on foreign debt. An important consequence of this work is that it is possible to accelerate the development of innovative financing solutions to ramp up investment and deliver clean energy for all. Keywords: Finance, Renewable Energy Projects, Risk Management