ABSTRACT
This chapter examines opportunities to utilize treaty law to extend the reach of European Union (EU) climate governance to the jurisdictions of Eastern Europe and the Caucasus which are members of the Energy Community. It argues that the Energy Community has the potential to be a significant force multiplier of EU climate diplomacy, while simultaneously assisting its Contracting Parties to engage in progressively more ambitious implementation of the Paris Agreement. The European Union has elaborated an increasingly ambitious body of laws concerning energy, embodied in Article 194 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union which promotes a 'triple functionality' of internal market liberalization, security of supply and environmental sustainability. The Energy Community Treaty tasks the Community with 'improv[ing] the environmental situation with regard to Network Energy and related energy efficiency, fostering the use of renewable energy, and setting out the conditions for energy trade in the single regulatory space'.
