Environmental Law Compliance and Its Implications for Oil and Gas Exploration and Production in Uganda

ABSTRACT

The study investigated environmental law compliance and its implications for oil and gas exploration and production in Uganda, it was guided by the following objectives; to examine the developments in the oil and gas exploration and production sector in Uganda, to identify and examine the environmental impacts of oil and gas exploration and production in Uganda, to review the activities involved in the oil and gas exploration and production processes, to analyze the national, regional and international policy and legal framework governing the oil and gas industry in Uganda, to examine the extent of compliance to environmental laws in Uganda; and to propose mechanisms for improving environmental law compliance in Uganda. This research was a purely qualitative approach. It was conducted using library and desk research methods. The study found that Uganda has international, regional, and national environmental law compliance requirements that are applicable to the oil and gas sector. The new petroleum laws also require EIA. Under the Petroleum (Exploration, Development, and Production) Act, 2013 the petroleum production license issued by the Minister shall require the licensee to cany out an Environmental Impact Assessment for the proposed project. The study recommended that Governments' policy framework and legal basis for taxation or Production Sharing Agreements with resource companies should be presented to the public clearly and comprehensively; Fiscal authority over resource-related revenue and borrowing should be clearly specified in the law and legislation should require full disclosure of all resource-related revenue, loan receipts and liabilities, and asset holdings. The study concluded that it is clear therefore that there is no environmental law compliance in Uganda's oil and gas industry. This stems from the weakness of the laws themselves to the failure of implementation. In the first place, the punishments prescribed are not deterrent enough. The report further discloses that transparency requirements in the two Acts don't cover financial transparency relating to the sector, which means that there is no guarantee that the public will have information about the revenue generated from the industry.