Editorial, Volume III, issue #03 - October 2005
Article from: OGEL 3 (2005), in Editorial
Introduction
This new OGEL issue follows up on earlier special issues with extended reporting on production-sharing contract and wind-power issues. In addition, I am pleased that we have been able, with our special issue editor, Veronica Brieno Rankin, to put together a special issue on coal. Coal used to be a "legacy" energy resource; but with the much increased prices for oil and gas, coal has won in attractiveness. That attractiveness is reinforced by two further factors: First, the climate change risks associated with goal are likely to be reduced as new technologies are developed that manage CO2 emissions better; Second, the continued reluctance in particular in EU countries to expand nuclear plants (involving a difficult trade-off between superior climate-change performance and a still unresolved waste decommissioning challenge) means in effect that coal, in particular "clean-coal" may experience a significant come-back.
The issue also starts to report on the aftermath of the many soured deals in post-privatisation utility investments in Argentina, mainly the about 40 international investment arbitration procedures before the ICSID. The CMS v Argentina case is the first awards on the merits which deals with Argentina's defenses, mainly related to its economic emergency.