탄소포집ㆍ이용ㆍ저장(CCUS) 기술에 대한 법적 대응 ― 환경리스크의 속성을 중심으로 ―

Recently, there has been a growing emphasis on “Carbon Capture, Use, and Storage (CCUS)” technology, one of the countermeasures against climate crisis. CCUS technology consists of CCS technology and CCU technology. The term “CCS technology” refers to the technology that collects carbon dioxide before it is emitted into the air from an emission source and then transfers it to be semi-permanently stored underground or in a safe strata of the ocean, and the term “CCU technology” refers to the technology that converts the collected carbon dioxide into useful resources such as polymers or biodiesel through chemical and biological conversion. CCUS technology is the one that uses or stores carbon dioxide using new technologies that have not been traditionally used, posing risks arising from its nature of uncertainty and unpredictability, as many new technologies. For example, potential health and ecosystem hazards due to massive leakage of high-pressure carbon dioxide or direct exposure to carbon dioxide streams should be considered for the capture and transport phase, and plausible impacts on ecosystem caused by massive injection and leakage damage caused by destruction or cracks of storage facilities should be assessed for the storage phase. As for CCUS, from the perspective of the current laws and regulations related to climate change, it is often recognized as a technology that should be recommended and encouraged as a greenhouse gas reduction technology, and the “Bill on the Collection, Transport, Storage and Utilization of Carbon Dioxide” recently proposed to the National Assembly is also based on this perspective. In addition, while CCUS raises a number of legal issues regarding the Wastes Control Act, the Marine Wastes Control Act, the Marine Environment Management Act, and the Waste-to-Country Movement Act, it is hard to find a law that can comprehensively regulate the environmental risks of CCUS. If we examines the characteristics of CCUS technology in terms of the uncertainty and gravity of harm, we can recognize CCUS as a type of environmental risk. Therefore, it is necessary to carefully consider which response would be desirable from a risk law perspective. Considering the advantages and limitations of the principles of formal law, substantial law and procedural law, an approach of legal pragmatism to CCUS can be deemed reasonable. Still, it is necessary to make continuous efforts to accurately understand and control the risk attributes of CCUS, and to introduce a reflexive structure that can swiftly incorporate ex post facto changes in risk awareness, and a decision-making system premised on sufficient risk communication to prevent vague and rash decisions based on technological optimism is also necessary.