The EU Green Deal, EIA and global warming: balancing the rule of law with the quest for climate neutrality

The application of Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) is one of the key instruments to integrate climate considerations into decision-making in the European Union. This chapter reveals that a broad integration of all relevant direct and indirect climate impacts of plans and projects into EIA is leading to additional legal uncertainty and complexities, in particular in the context of the scope 3-emissions. Such off-sites emissions, caused in the value chain of economic activities, are not always easy to identify, which can give rise to challenges in light of the rule of law. However, with reference to the wording of the revised EIA Directive as well as recent decisions of Norwegian and UK courts, in which it was held that combustion emissions of oil field developments need to be included in an EIA, this chapter argues that also scope 3-emissions are to be integrated into an EIA. This is necessary to ensure proactive transparency and effective participation.