Energy Dispute Resolution: Investment Protection, Transit and the Energy Charter Treaty

Energy Dispute Resolution: Investment Protection, Transit and the Energy Charter Treaty is a compilation of written contributions prepared in the context of a conference organized by the Energy Charter Secretariat, in cooperation with five other well-known legal institutions (the Arbitration Institute of the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce, the British Institute of International and Comparative Law, the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes, the International Chamber of Commerce and the Permanent Court of Arbitration). This highly successful conference took place in Brussels in October 2009. Energy Dispute Resolution: Investment Protection, Transit and the Energy Charter Treaty focuses on investment arbitration under the Energy Charter Treaty (or ECT) and on transit dispute resolution under the ECT.

Part I consists of a review of awards, decisions and other developments in ECT investment arbitrations, of which nearly 30 were in the public domain as of 1 January 2011. Part II deals with the relationship between bilateral investment treaties, the ECT as a multilateral investment treaty, and European Union (EU) law, and addresses the question of whether conflict between these legal systems is inevitable. In Part III, the book reviews the highly developed provisional application mechanism of the ECT, particularly in relation to Russia, which signed the ECT in 1994 but has never ratified it. Part IV deals with the energy transit provisions of the ECT and the Treaty’s potential application with respect to East-West energy transit and supply disputes. The book also contains an Editor’s Preface, introductory and closing remarks, a table of contents, a detailed index, and an Appendix in the form of a CD-ROM containing the rules of arbitration of the three international arbitration mechanisms provided by the ECT (ICSID, SCC and ad hoc UNCITRAL arbitration).

The book is of international application, particularly within the 51-country Energy Charter constituency (Western, Central and Eastern Europe, the former Soviet Union, Japan, Turkey, Mongolia and Australia), but is relevant to energy and international arbitration lawyers worldwide.