THE RIGHT TO A HEALTHY ENVIRONMENT AND THE PRINCIPLE OF SUSTAINABILITY : Integrating equity and sustainability within the rights to pollute under the Kyoto Protocol

Abstract

The achievement of a certain level” of environmental quality is legally formulated within the Right to a Healthy Environment. National constitutions and international instruments guarantee this right. These instruments use different terms to define the level of environmental quality of the objects they seek to protect. However, the legal content and status of the RHE depends on properly balancing its constitutive elements. The context where this right is applied could demand a complex normative integration process with other applicable rules. The result can help to determine whether the level of the environment´s quality is culturally relative, or whether it is possible to define a unique legal core applicable to different contexts. This research assesses the integration of the RHE with the aim to reduce GHG emission under UNFCCC and the rights to pollute under the Kyoto Protocol. This thesis concludes that States have compromised atmospheric trust assets through allowing unsustainable levels of GHG emission via the cap-and-trade scheme under the Kyoto Protocol. In light of the best available information about climate change the level of emission established in the cap constitutes a dangerous interference with the climate system and it creates serious inconsistent with the realization of the RHE.