This study reviews deployment subsidies for biomass power in two European countries, Germany and the United Kingdom.

Its primary goal is to better inform debates about cost-effectiveness by exploring the methods required to assess cost-effectiveness and by estimating the general magnitude and range of benefits in several key areas.

The study forms one of a series of three looking at the cost-effectiveness of renewable energy deployment subsidies, each one focusing on different technologies and countries. The increased deployment of low-carbon energy is one of the principal interventions required to avoid catastrophic climate change. At the same time, the success of deployment will depend upon government policy that is effective and that uses resources efficiently. This is central to maximizing the amount of renewables deployed given the resources that are available, and to ensuring that subsidies for renewables remain politically viable. These studies represent a first effort to develop an appropriate multi-criteria framework for evaluating the cost-effectiveness of renewable energy subsidies, taking into account all costs and the wide range of potential benefits.

Two years after Vattenfall brought Germany to international arbitration for a second time (Vattenfall II), the German public is still left out in the dark.

This briefing note reviews the background to the case on Germany’s decision to phase out nuclear power and outlines its current state of play. A commentary follows on the transparency provisions applicable to arbitrations at the International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID), and discusses how some ICSID tribunals have dealt with matters of transparency and confidentiality. Finally, it argues for the release of decisions, orders, and submissions by the parties to the public, noting that there is nothing in the ICSID Rules that would disallow this type of transparency.

In 2012 the Government of Manitoba released its environment plan, TomorrowNow.

Its commitments include creating a green economy action plan and updating the climate change plan for the Province of Manitoba. In efforts to meet these commitments, the International Institute for Sustainable Development assisted the province in developing its innovative green economy action plan as well as updating its climate change plan to address the need to transition to a green economy and low-carbon development framework for Manitoba. The work was carried out through a series of dialogue sessions with key stakeholders on climate change and the green economy. This background paper provides information to the public about Manitoba’s peatlands sector and its importance for the province to address climate change and strengthen its green economy.

This briefing note presents a series of resilience indicators as examples for measuring the resilience of local food systems based on community consultations in Honduras and Nicaragua.

It is primarily addressed to food security and resilience practitioners in Central America and for those working on climate and food security metrics more generally.This is the second briefing note in an IISD series on climate-resilient value chains and food systems.

This report analyzes kerosene subsidies received by the state governments through the Public Distribution System.

Analysis includes patterns of distribution across income deciles and across states.

This report tracks the most recent national policies on energy subsidies and analyses the government’s subsidy expenditure on different fuels – kerosene, diesel and LPG.

It is an unfortunate reality that in Canada, there is little measurement of environmental trends, and the indicators themselves are often rather narrow in their scope.

To address these shortcomings, the Ivey Foundation has funded IISD to prepare an inclusive wealth report for Canada. The report will be indicator based, with strong narrative elements to help readers understand what is being measured and why it is important. This one-page document outlines the issue, and describes what the report will look like, and what its purpose is.

Fossil-fuel subsidies are prevalent in many countries.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) has estimated that consumer subsidies to fossil fuels amounted to US$548 billion in 2013. In the same year, subsidies to renewable energy were estimated at US$121 billion. However, a comparison of numbers does not reveal the extent to which renewable energy is being disadvantaged in favour of continued reliance on fossil-fuel generation. The high level of fossil-fuel subsidies certainly creates disadvantages for renewable energy, but to understand the true impact it is necessary to explore the range of subsidy mechanisms rather than focus simply on the magnitude of the cost of subsidies.

In this paper the Global Subsidies Initiative presents a more complete examination of how fossil-fuel subsidies can impact the deployment of renewable energy. The paper discusses the effect of fossil-fuel subsidies on the cost competiveness of renewables, the incumbent advantage of fossil-fuel-powered generators and the distortion of investment decisions.

The background brief describes the history of IISD’s work and vision on mining and its development to a mature multidisciplinary and inclusive understanding of mining in relation to sustainable development.

IISD’s Mining Initiative seeks to promote inclusive growth and social development without compromising the environment. These interconnected components bring in a set of mutually supportive goals and responsibilities for companies, governments and communities.

The transition to applying the concepts of inclusive growth and social development is essential from a sustainable development viewpoint, and for many companies it is already well underway. Where IISD will make a powerful contribution is in the development of an integrated toolkit that will allow companies, governments and communities to identify an optimal mix of fiscal and non- fiscal economic benefits to maximize a win–win–win conception of mining projects. IISD will achieve this by marrying its economic analysis with its legal expertise to identify the best mechanisms for adopting and implementing these tools in mining and fiscal law frameworks.

The objective of enhancing the social and economic benefits without compromising the environment is equally relevant. While mining will always result in some environmental impacts, the scale, duration  and degree of landscape change or air and water impacts will vary by the type of mining (e.g., underground versus strip mining) and scale of the project. These differences must be understood—and strategies developed—that reflect the potential variations in impacts of mining operations on human and ecological systems.

To support the goal of raising awareness among governments and communities about effective tools and opportunities, IISD will develop, apply, revise and promote a model that will enable optimization of the value of mining investments in a win–win–win context. This applied research will be complemented by development of training materials and effective capacity provision.

Between January and April 2014 IISD conducted an assessment aiming to evaluate the mining law and policies of the Dominican Republic and their implementation under the Intergovernmental Forum on Mining, Minerals, Metals and Sustainable Development (IGF) Mining Policy Framework (MPF).

This report is the result of desk-based research, and an 11-day field study in the Dominican Republic with visits to mining areas and numerous discussions with a range of stakeholders. A summary of the major findings from each of the six MPF themes (legal and policy environment; financial benefit optimization; socioeconomic benefit optimization; environmental management; post-mining transition; and artisanal and small-scale mining) helps identify the major characteristics of the Dominican Republic’s mining law and policy framework. The report also contains a strength-weakness analysis and recommended key priority areas.