Compensation for Marine Ecological Damage: From ‘Tasman Sea’ to ‘Sanchi’

The research on marine ecological compensation is aimed to protect the marine environment and sustainably utilize marine ecosystem services, and is an important institutional instrument for coordination of the relationships among environmental, economic and other social interests. The legal mechanism of marine ecological compensation should be an important way to effectively deal with the contradictions (for examples: the value loss of marine ecosystem services, destruction of marine biodiversity, etc.) in marine eco-environmental protection. This paper firstly introduces the case of the “Sanchi” ship accident, which is regarded as the first collision case of a tanker carrying gas condensate in world shipping history, and also provides a detailed analysis of the “Tasman Sea” ship case which is regarded as the first compensation claim for marine ecological damage in China, and makes some related discussions on marine ecological compensation concerning the two cases. Then, the paper probes into the research theme from four aspects: China’s legislative deployment, the legal connotation of marine ecological damage (including the current legal status of compensation claims, subjects of compensation claims, the compensation scope and the evaluation system.), major challenges in legal practice, and remediation of marine ecological damage in China. Finally, the paper provides some suggestions on marine ecological damage compensation for the final settlement in the “Sanchi” case, and tries to explore the future trend of the research theme based on the China’s marine strategy.