Catálogo de publicaciones - libros

We can conclude that oil pollution incidents, national regulations and the interpretation of the conventions by domestic judges and the pressure of a transnational organization, such as the European Community, can exert a strong influence on the development of the international oil pollution damage regime.

By introducing the COPE Fund Proposal, the European Commission has urged the international community to adopt the 2003 Supplementary Fund Protocol, thus providing for a (voluntary) third tier of compensation for oil pollution damage at global level. Through the voices of the EC Member States — parties to the 1992 Civil Liability and Fund Conventions — the main elements of the (initial) COPE Fund Proposal have been set at the international legal scenery. Furthermore, the European Community is exercising its exclusive competence in the jurisdiction, recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters to stimulate the EC Member States to ratify the 2003 Protocol.

For the time being the European Community has succeeded in its attempts to change the international regime by exerting high pressure on the international level. Nevertheless, it is questionable if the European Commission — having full membership of the IMO in view - will limit its efforts to this effect, so the question mark remains as to the reaction of the international level on this continuing pressure.

Research in the domain of biologically inspired walking machines has been ongoing for over 20 years [59, 166, 190, 199, 207]. Most of it has focused on the construction of such machines [34, 47, 216, 223], on a dynamic gait control [43, 117, 201] and on the generation of an advanced locomotion control [30, 56, 104, 120], for instance on rough terrain [5, 66, 102, 180, 192]. In general, these walking machines were solely designed for the purpose of motion without responding to environmental stimuli. However, from this research area, only a few works have presented physical walking machines reacting to an environmental stimulus using different approaches [6, 36, 72, 95]. On the one hand, this shows that less attention has been paid to walking machines performing reactive behaviors. On the other hand, such complex systems can serve as a methodology for the study of embodied systems consisting of sensors and actuators for explicit agent-environment interactions.

At the very end of this Chapter it is necessary to stress that the Latvian legislator has put into force all possible laws on marine environment liability as is done also elsewhere in the world, but it is a fight against the consequences, not against the source of the problem. Of course, it is beyond doubt, that it is vital to have appropriate rules for protecting the interests of the victims as well as rules for punishing “guilty” ship owners and/or operators. But it seems that the right medicine is to tighten the requirements, which are directly aimed at minimizing the possibility of pollution. In the author’s opinion attention should be paid to the following aspects:

Although the international compensation scheme has tended to focus on the compensation of victims of the economic consequences of oil spills, the experiences over the last 25 years have shown that the Member States have been willing and able to adapt the international compensation to the needs of society, in particular as regards the impact of pollution on the environment. Whilst there is probably little that can be done to extend the scope of compensation for environmental damage within the current legal framework, the existing Working Group may consider at a later stage whether the 1992 Conventions should be amended so as to widen their application in this important area.

Due to the infancy of the Environmental Damage Assessment process in Canada, it is clearly at a stage in its history where conflict emerges between the theoretical aspects developed by its creators and its use by judges. We have not been able to find cases where the process was taken into account by Canadian courts nor have we found specific legislation that addresses the issue of damage assessment. However, a number of authors recognize the use of EDA and highly recommend its application in the legal system, partly because of the gaps between fines and actual damage in environmental offences. The development of the Environmental Damages Fund by Environment Canada may prove to be a strong influence on judges to call upon EDA. The impact, if any, of such developments on the statutory civil Liability of the SSOP Fund remains to be seen.

We can conclude that oil pollution incidents, national regulations and the interpretation of the conventions by domestic judges and the pressure of a transnational organization, such as the European Community, can exert a strong influence on the development of the international oil pollution damage regime.

By introducing the COPE Fund Proposal, the European Commission has urged the international community to adopt the 2003 Supplementary Fund Protocol, thus providing for a (voluntary) third tier of compensation for oil pollution damage at global level. Through the voices of the EC Member States — parties to the 1992 Civil Liability and Fund Conventions — the main elements of the (initial) COPE Fund Proposal have been set at the international legal scenery. Furthermore, the European Community is exercising its exclusive competence in the jurisdiction, recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters to stimulate the EC Member States to ratify the 2003 Protocol.

For the time being the European Community has succeeded in its attempts to change the international regime by exerting high pressure on the international level. Nevertheless, it is questionable if the European Commission — having full membership of the IMO in view - will limit its efforts to this effect, so the question mark remains as to the reaction of the international level on this continuing pressure.

This paper conveys two principal important messages. The first message is of a methodological nature and refers to the review of the main reasons that steer economists to an interest in the field of the economic valuation of the environmental benefits. As we have seen, policy guidance constitutes an important motivation since most of the monetary value assessment of these benefits are crucial when performing a cost-benefit analysis of any environmental protection project. Furthermore, since most of environmental benefits are not market priced, we have identify and described the wide range of economic valuation tools that the economist has access to when deciding to run an economic valuation exercise. The second message is of an empirical nature and refers to presentation of two case studies. In each valuation study, we not only explain how different economic valuation methodologies, including travel cost, contingent valuation and stated choice method, can be applied to the economic valuation of marine environmental benefits but also stresses the link between the valuation estimates and policy guidance. In other words, a economic valuation exercise needs a follow-up. In particular, the valuation results always need to be contrasted with the monetary costs regarding the (specific programme of) marine environmental protection. From a cost benefit perspective, the protection is recommended if and only if the benefits from such a marine protection programme far exceeds the costs.

We can conclude that oil pollution incidents, national regulations and the interpretation of the conventions by domestic judges and the pressure of a transnational organization, such as the European Community, can exert a strong influence on the development of the international oil pollution damage regime.

By introducing the COPE Fund Proposal, the European Commission has urged the international community to adopt the 2003 Supplementary Fund Protocol, thus providing for a (voluntary) third tier of compensation for oil pollution damage at global level. Through the voices of the EC Member States — parties to the 1992 Civil Liability and Fund Conventions — the main elements of the (initial) COPE Fund Proposal have been set at the international legal scenery. Furthermore, the European Community is exercising its exclusive competence in the jurisdiction, recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters to stimulate the EC Member States to ratify the 2003 Protocol.

For the time being the European Community has succeeded in its attempts to change the international regime by exerting high pressure on the international level. Nevertheless, it is questionable if the European Commission — having full membership of the IMO in view - will limit its efforts to this effect, so the question mark remains as to the reaction of the international level on this continuing pressure.

Research in the domain of biologically inspired walking machines has been ongoing for over 20 years [59, 166, 190, 199, 207]. Most of it has focused on the construction of such machines [34, 47, 216, 223], on a dynamic gait control [43, 117, 201] and on the generation of an advanced locomotion control [30, 56, 104, 120], for instance on rough terrain [5, 66, 102, 180, 192]. In general, these walking machines were solely designed for the purpose of motion without responding to environmental stimuli. However, from this research area, only a few works have presented physical walking machines reacting to an environmental stimulus using different approaches [6, 36, 72, 95]. On the one hand, this shows that less attention has been paid to walking machines performing reactive behaviors. On the other hand, such complex systems can serve as a methodology for the study of embodied systems consisting of sensors and actuators for explicit agent-environment interactions.

Research in the domain of biologically inspired walking machines has been ongoing for over 20 years [59, 166, 190, 199, 207]. Most of it has focused on the construction of such machines [34, 47, 216, 223], on a dynamic gait control [43, 117, 201] and on the generation of an advanced locomotion control [30, 56, 104, 120], for instance on rough terrain [5, 66, 102, 180, 192]. In general, these walking machines were solely designed for the purpose of motion without responding to environmental stimuli. However, from this research area, only a few works have presented physical walking machines reacting to an environmental stimulus using different approaches [6, 36, 72, 95]. On the one hand, this shows that less attention has been paid to walking machines performing reactive behaviors. On the other hand, such complex systems can serve as a methodology for the study of embodied systems consisting of sensors and actuators for explicit agent-environment interactions.