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Energy Dispute Resolution: Investment Protection, Transit and the Energy Charter Treaty
G Coop (ed)
Huntington: JurisNet, 2011 ; i-lxxxi + 390 pages and CD Rom. US$ 150 (hardback); ISBN 978 1 933833 79 8.
The Energy Charter Treaty (ECT), which was signed in December 1994 and entered into force in April 1998, is generally considered, as witnessed by the growing number of cases being brought under its rules, a relatively successful, yet young, example of a 'sector-specific' multilateral treaty with binding force. Furthermore, the ever-increasing political importance and economic value of the energy sector in the modern world economy makes the ECT a particularly sensitive legal tool of energy dispute resolution. It is therefore no surprise that the ECT has attracted a great deal of attention and that several publications have been specifically devoted to analysing it.1 Energy Dispute Resolution: Investment Protection, Transit and the Energy Charter Treaty is a recent and most welcomed addition to this growing body of literature.
Edited by Graham Coop with the assistance of Philippe Gurd Gross, the book compiles the papers presented during a conference hosted in October 2009 in Brussels by the Energy Charter Secretariat, in conjunction with a number of other national and international institutions and organisations.2 The conference was dedicated to both investment protection and transit issues in the energy dispute resolution context. The topic of the conference, and consequently of the book, reflects not only the increasing number of arbitration cases decided under the ECT but also the emerging relevance of energy transit as a central legal and political issue, as clearly illustrated by the Russia-Ukraine gas crises of January 2006 and January 2009. Indeed, as mentioned in A Mernier's introductory remarks (p xlv), investments in the energy sector can only produce revenue 'if the energy cycle conveys a reliable stream of energy from the point of production to the point of final consumption. It is therefore important to protect not only investments as such, but also flows of energy in transit'.
The book, which follows the order of the sessions of the conference, presents, in addition to introductory remarks and opening comments by A Mernier, U Franke, J A Fry, M Kinnear, CMJ Kröner and N Gallagher, 14 chapters divided into four parts plus...