Energy treaty arbitration against a sovereign state
Following expropriation of a long-term energy concession, we secured a substantial award for our client under investment treaty protections.
Client Challenge
Our client, an energy sector investor, held a long-term concession that was expropriated following a change in the host state's regulatory position. The commercial contract offered limited recourse, since the state's own courts were the designated forum — leaving the client's only credible remedy in the protections of a bilateral investment treaty, a different discipline from the commercial arbitration the client's in-house team was used to.
Legal Strategy
Eleanor Whitfield led a strategy built around establishing the treaty's fair and equitable treatment standard had been breached, coordinating expert evidence on the concession's valuation with the treaty argument from the outset rather than treating quantum as a separate, later workstream. Sophie Lindqvist led enforcement planning in parallel, mapping the state's assets in enforcement-friendly jurisdictions well before any award existed.
Turning Point
Tribunal-ordered document production revealed internal state correspondence acknowledging the regulatory change had been substantially motivated by pressure from a competing, state-linked energy interest — materially undermining the state's public justification for the expropriation and reframing the tribunal's view of the state's conduct.
The tribunal found in the client's favour, awarding substantial damages under the treaty's investment protections — among the largest awards the firm has secured in its arbitration practice.
Business Impact
Beyond the damages recovered, the award gave the client's board a clear precedent to point to in evaluating future investments in jurisdictions with similar treaty protections, and materially informed the client's subsequent political risk insurance strategy.
Who worked this matter.
Speak with Eleanor Whitfield.
Managing Partner, International Arbitration
Contact Eleanor