Abstract

Alternate Dispute Resolution (ADR) mostly denotes a broad range of dispute resolution processes that serves as a means for disagreeing parties to come to a common agreement without resorting to litigation. It collectively refers to the methods in which the parties can settle disputes outside the courts with the help of a third party. Environmental disputes are extremely complex and hard to resolve due to their extensive effect on the general interests of communities, individuals, organisations etc. Previously, there were only limited ways of dealing with environmental disputes, which mostly involved political action and litigation. However, with ADR being extensively accepted as an effective alternative to resolving disputes, this has begun to change. Even though environmental law gives rise to a lot of challenges due to the complex nature of problems it produces, ADR offers a widely recognised, accepted, viable and flexible resolution mechanism. The parties involved in any environmental disputes opt for ADR as an alternative to litigation. ADR is indeed an expeditious mode of dispute settlement than litigation, however, the current dialogue over environment cases running among courts and academia is that the online arbitration mechanism is even more efficient and will be able to solve the matter quickly without causing harm to the environment. This paper will begin with the general discussion of how environmental issue can be resolved through traditional ADR mechanism, thereafter, this work will illustrate the online dispute resolution (ODR) mechanism, how it is done, benefits and challenges of ODR and understand if ODR method would be an effective mechanism to resolve environment dispute in the future.

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