Conflict And Coordination Of Renewable Energy Policies And WTO Subsidy Rules

Government support for renewable energy is the primary battleground at the WTO. After elaborating the trends and types of the renewable energy policies, this paper makes a general analysis of whether the renewable energy policies will conflict with WTO subsidy rules. This paper examines if each type of the renewable energy policies constitutes actionable subsidies within the meaning of Agreement on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures from the aspects of financial contribution, benefit, specificity and adverse effects. The Agreement on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures prohibits import substitution subsidies. For governments, subsidies to the domestic producers have the same effect as import substitution subsidies. As for the Agreement on Agriculture, this paper pays attention to the classification of biofuels and upstream and downstream subsidies. Then this paper looks into the panel report of the Canada-renewable energy. The panel report shows that different approaches in benefit analysis make different outcomes. Canada-renewable energy doesn’t involve the applicability of GATT Article XX to the SCM agreement. The debate on this issue will continue, this paper tends to be applicable. Moreover, the revival of non-actionable subsidies also can create policy space for renewable energy policies.This paper is innovative in two points:First, based on the classification of renewable energy policies, it specifically analyzes the key issues of whether each type of the policies will constitute subsidies within the meaning of the WTO subsidy rules. Second, the panel report of the Canada-renewable energy was circulated to Members on19December2012, this paper gives a detailed analysis instantly.