The European Green Deal and the Energy Charter Treaty: Chronicle of a Breakup Foretold?

Abstract

This chapter analyses a subtle (and even unintended) but significant “beyond-EU” impact of the European Green Deal (EGD) adoption: the “breakup” of the most controversial treaty on energy investment, the Energy Charter Treaty (ECT). In particular, the chapter —through the study of relevant European Union (EU) and EU Member States’ documents, case law and doctrine — depicts the (most than probable) exodus of the EU and its Member States from the ECT as a result of the EGD’s commitment to more ambitious climate action. While the chapter does not intend to provide a strict cause-and-effect analysis, the contention is that the announced mass withdrawal can be understood, at least to an important extent, as a response to the tensions arising from the action required by the EGD’s climate goals vis-à-vis the strong normative and institutional protection that the ECT affords to foreign fossil fuel investors and that is leading to multi-million dollar investor-state disputes.