Environmental law has been changing drastically in recent years. While the „classical“ task of curbing local and regional risks to natural resources is still crucial, a substantial, though somehow tardy progress, can be observed in those areas. Under the global imperative of effective climate mitigation, however, increasingly other fields of action require attention, which puts democratic decision making procedures under tremendous pressure: if climate policy measures turn out to be inadequate, the resulting penalty will not be simply a delay but the non-compliance with its implied greenhouse-gas-emission reduction targets set out by the Paris Convention, most likely entailing fatal consequences. Bearing this in mind, the following analysis focusses on climate protection law instruments in the areas of transport and agriculture.