ENVIRONMENTAL LAW IN THE DIGITAL AND CLIMATE ERA: EMERGING CHALLENGES OF AI, CLIMATE CHANGE, ENVIRONMENTAL GOVERNANCE AND SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

Abstract

Environmental law has undergone a significant transformation from a regulatory framework primarily concerned with controlling pollution and conserving natural resources into a broader legal field addressing human rights, climate change, environmental justice, sustainable development, corporate accountability, technological risks and participatory governance. The contemporary environmental crisis is no longer limited to conventional forms of air, water and land pollution. Climate change, biodiversity loss, resource depletion, rapid urbanisation, industrial expansion and technologically driven economic development have created complex legal challenges that require environmental regulation to operate across traditional institutional and disciplinary boundaries. At the same time, emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence, big data, remote sensing and digital environmental monitoring are creating new opportunities for environmental governance while also raising questions concerning transparency, accountability, privacy, data ownership and regulatory capacity.

India provides an important jurisdiction for examining these developments because environmental protection has increasingly become connected with constitutional rights and judicially developed principles. Article 21 of the Constitution has been interpreted in environmental cases as encompassing protection against serious environmental harm, while Articles 48A and 51A(g) provide an important constitutional foundation for environmental protection. The Environment (Protection) Act, 1986 and other sectoral environmental statutes provide the principal legislative framework, supplemented by environmental impact assessment, regulatory institutions and specialised adjudication. The Supreme Court has further developed principles such as sustainable development, the precautionary principle, the polluter pays principle and the public trust doctrine. Recent constitutional environmental jurisprudence has also recognised the relationship between environmental protection and climate-change impacts