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Showing posts from April, 2018

Safety of German Offshore Windparks Questioned After Major Incident

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The first German offshore wind farm `Alpha Ventus´, located 45 km off the coast of the German island of Borkum, has been considerably damaged. At the beginning of April, the main parts of the gondola of one wind turbine broke off and fell 90 meters into the North Sea. The park features 120 structurally identical wind turbines that have been produced by the German manufacturer ADWEN. The reasons for the damage are entirely unclear, but a fierce debate on liability and the safety of offshore wind farms is already on its way in the north of Germany.

New Publication: The ´Hydrogen Economy´ in the United States and the European Union: Regulating Innovation to Combat Climate Change

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I had the honour to contribute a chapter to Donald Zillman, Martha Roggenkamp, Leroy Paddock and Lee Godden (eds). `Innovation in Energy Law and Technology´ (Oxford University Press, 2018). My colleague Prof. Joshua Fershee of West Virginia University and me explored the legal perspectives for the creation of  `Hydrogen Economies´ in the US and the EU. We used the example of fuel-cell cars and power-to-gas to illustrate legal possibilities and barriers. The book is available here . The introduction of the chapter is reproduced below.