Wolfgang Köck

European and German Nature Conservation Instruments and their Adaptation to Climate Change—A Legal Analysis

The article discusses the most significant legal problems facing the makers of conservation policy in the European Union and in Germany in adapting biodiversity to climate change. In the introduction, we give an overview of the possible consequences of climate change for species and landscapes and propose a number of adaptation measures. We then analyse and discuss three issues relating to the policy instruments of European and German environmental law: 1. the problems associated with protected areas in terms of justification and flexibility; 2. the need for more biotope networks, especially in agriculturally dominated landscapes; and 3. the potential and shortcomings of regional and local planning instruments.

Activating Spatial I Planning Law: Options for the Reduction of Land Consumption

The German Federal Environment Agency (Umweltbundesamt) commissioned the Department of Environmental and Planning Law of the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research - UFZ to analyse the capacity of spatial planning law to reduce land consumption, particularly inquiring into the specific shortcomings of the applicable provisions and making recommendations as to how the legal frame could be made more effective. This article summarises the results of the analysis and the recommendations for a more effective spatial planning law according to the reduction of land consumption.

The eu regulation on invasive alien species

The new eu regulation on invasive alien species constitutes a further key European legislative act – alongside the Habitats Directive – aimed at achieving biodiversity conservation. As such it will be of highly practical significance in the years to come, given that the obligations arising from it will necessarily be connected with impacts on trade and transportation. The following article provides information about the problems invasive alien species (ias) cause for biodiversity as a protected resource. It also elucidates and assesses the new European regulation and, taking German law as an example, also discusses its consequences for national-level strategies aimed at protecting against ias.

Management of Non-indigenous Species and Invasive Alien Species

When seeking to manage the risks to marine ecosystems and other marine assets arising from the introduction of invasive alien species by human activities, there are two challenges to be surmounted: first, how to avoid the unintentional introduction of non-indigenous species and, second, how to prevent the intentional introduction of such species which, according to both scientific knowledge and practical experience, are “invasive”.

Umwelt- und Naturschutzrecht

Aufgabe normativer Ethik ist es, bei der Wahl zwischen Handlungsalternativen zu beurteilen und zu begrunden, welche von ihnen die moralisch richtige ist. [...] Der Begriff ›Umweltethik‹ kennzeichnet dabei den Bereich der Ethik, dem es um die Bewertung von Handlungen mit Auswirkungen auf die belebte und unbelebte Natur geht. Als Angewandte Ethik beurteilt sie in konkreten Fallen unter Berucksichtigung empirischer Fakten wie moralischer Prinzipien, welche Handlungen im Hinblick auf die Umwelt erlaubt, geboten oder aber verboten sind.