Commit to Greener Arbitrations and Mediations
Thanks to initiatives of colleagues in the arbitration and mediation fields, practitioners are becoming more aware of what needs to be done to reduce the environmental impact of these processes.
In 2019, international arbitrator Lucy Greenwood launched the Green Pledge, which asks dispute resolution practitioners to commit to actions such as avoiding printing and unnecessary travel (especially air travel), using technology including videoconferencing where appropriate, and engaging service providers and suppliers prepared to make similar commitments.
The Green Pledge now has hundreds of signatories and resulted in Lucy creating the Campaign for Greener Arbitrations (the “Campaign”), which brings together a range of stakeholders aiming to reduce the carbon footprint of the international arbitration community. The Environmental Impact section of the Campaign’s website brings home the significant environmental impact of a medium to large international arbitration, calculating that just under 20,000 trees could be required to offset the total carbon emissions resulting from just one such proceeding. The Campaign tells us that the three most effective measures for reducing this impact are reducing long-haul air travel and eliminating hard copy filings and the use of disposable coffee cups. Further studies are to be published.
Significantly, following a public consultation in early 2021, the Campaign launched a Framework and related Protocols which aspire to encourage better environmental practices by the various players involved in arbitrations.
The Green Pledge has inspired a broadly similar initiative in the mediation field thanks to mediators Anna Howard and John Sturrock QC . In 2020, John created the World Mediators Alliance on Climate Change, which set up a working group to explore how the environmental footprint of mediators could be reduced. This produced the Mediators' Green Pledge: see Anna's article on the Kluwer Mediation Blog for more details.
See also Kim Franklin QC's article Sustainable ADR - Recalibrating for The Future: It's Not Hard Being Green reporting on the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators’ London Branch joint webinar with the London Court of International Arbitration held on 18 February 2021, at which both Lucy and Anna spoke.
Please consider signing up to both Pledges and following the practices they recommend.
The Campaign’s logo is reproduced above with the kind permission of Lucy Greenwood.