I’ve taken the pledge for green­er arbit­ra­tions. What’s that?

The inter­na­tion­al arbit­ra­tion com­munity has talked about how we might arbit­rate cli­mate change issues. We’ve not spent the same amount of time talk­ing about our own impact on cli­mate change. We need to do that. Bet­ter still, we need to act on it.

The pledge for green­er arbit­ra­tions out­lines a few spe­cif­ic steps which an arbit­ra­tion prac­ti­tion­er can take to reduce the impact of arbit­ra­tion on the cli­mate. As an arbit­ra­tion prac­ti­tion­er com­mit­ted to ensur­ing that I min­im­ise the envir­on­ment­al impact of my prac­tice, I com­mit to:

• Cre­at­ing a work space with a reduced envir­on­ment­al foot­print, includ­ing look­ing for oppor­tun­it­ies to reduce energy con­sump­tion and waste;
• Cor­res­pond­ing elec­tron­ic­ally, unless hard copy cor­res­pond­ence is needed in the cir­cum­stances, while being mind­ful that e‑mail has a car­bon foot­print as well;
• Avoid­ing print­ing and request­ing the use of elec­tron­ic rather than hard cop­ies of doc­u­ments and pro­mot­ing the use of elec­tron­ic bundles at hear­ings;
• Using, where pos­sible, sup­pli­ers and ser­vice pro­viders who are com­mit­ted to redu­cing their envir­on­ment­al foot­print, for example when arran­ging an arbit­ra­tion hear­ing;
• Avoid­ing unne­ces­sary travel and using video-con­fer­en­cing as an altern­at­ive;
• Encour­aging or sug­gest­ing to oth­ers, where appro­pri­ate, video-con­fer­en­cing as an altern­at­ive to travel, also for the pur­poses of fact-find­ing or inter­view­ing wit­nesses or experts;
• Con­sid­er­ing and ques­tion­ing the need to fly at all times and off­set­ting car­bon emis­sions for any arbit­ra­tion-related travel.

The pledge for green­er arbit­ra­tions was Lucy Green­wood’s idea. If you’re an arbit­ra­tion prac­ti­tion­er and would like to take it as well, you may do so here.