The First MOX Plant Award: The Need to Harmonize Competing Environmental Regimes and Dispute Settlement Procedures

The MOX Plant award, rendered on 3 July 2003, contributes to elucidation of the right of access to environmental information under the OSPAR Convention. However, the ‘self-contained’ vision of the OSPAR Convention embraced by the majority on the panel – rejecting in effect the relevance of competing international environmental regimes and dispute settlement procedures – deserves criticism. First of all, it leads to the establishment of a more limited right of access to environmental information under the OSPAR Convention than is recognized under other arrangements. It also represents an approach which might exacerbate the fragmentation of an increasingly complex body of international law.