Environmental and Energy Law Program

Wendy Jacobs, one of the nation’s most highly celebrated environmental law experts, was the founding director of the first-ever environmental law and policy clinic at Harvard Law School.

Jody Freeman discusses the progress the nation has made in protecting the environment since Earth Day was founded in 1970, the Trump administration’s efforts to undo Obama-era federal climate regulations, and COVID-19’s urgent lessons for the planet’s health.

Though the news isn’t all bad, Harvard Law Professors Jody Freeman and Richard Lazarus warned of brewing issues ahead at the annual Supreme Court Environmental Law Review and Preview.

The American Academy of Arts and Sciences has announced that Jody Freeman LL.M. '91 S.J.D. '95, Archibald Cox Professor of Law, has been elected a member of the honorary society, one of twelve members of the Harvard faculty to receive the honor this year.

A plan designed by a team of Harvard University students to create a reliable source of renewable, affordable electricity for a Puerto Rican community hammered in 2017 by Hurricane Maria has moved a step closer to reality. The students are enrolled in Professor Wendy Jacobs' Harvard’s “Climate Solutions Living Lab” course.

A letter drafted by HLS's Emmett Environmental Law and Policy Clinic Director Wendy Jacobs, and signed by nearly 100 hospital leaders and Harvard faculty, calls on the Environmental Protection Agency to withdraw its proposed rule on scientific “transparency,” saying that the change would drastically limit the scientific and medical knowledge that underlie a host of EPA regulations that protect human health.

In her Last Lecture, Professor Jody Freeman LL.M. ’91 S.J.D. ’95 encouraged the class of 2018 to think broadly about what success means, in their future career and also in life.

Antonio Oposa Jr. LL.M. ’97 reflects on his legacy and efforts to bring environmental sustainability to his home country, the Philippines.

John Leshy, former solicitor for the U.S. Interior Department, sought to set the record straight on public lands Wednesday at Harvard, disputing activists’ views opposing U.S. government ownership and reminding listeners that the divisiveness of the debate is what should concern users of those vast areas traditionally managed for public benefit and enjoyment.

Ethel Branch ’08 grew up on her family’s ranch with no electricity, no running water, and a long list of questions about injustice. As she grew up, Branch knew she had to address these questions. “That confusion as to why the world changed when you crossed the Navajo Nation boundary line was a driving question for my youth and my life,” says Branch. It propelled her to study law and policy. And three years ago, at age 36, it led her to become Attorney General of the Navajo Nation.

Led by Professor Wendy Jacobs, director of the Emmett Environmental Law and Policy Clinic at Harvard Law School, the Climate Solutions Living Lab course launched last spring to help push forward the transition to a carbon-free future that supports planetary and human health.

“The Remarkable Evolution of American Environmental Law from Nixon to Trump and Beyond” panel during Harvard Law School's bicentennial summit focused on the uncertain future of the Environmental Protection Agency in the current administration. Panelists A. James Barnes ’67, Richard J. Lazarus ‘79, William Reilly ’65 and Gina McCarthy looked at the EPA’s distinguished history.

Joseph Goffman, who, over a 30-year career, has shaped environmental law and policy at the highest levels of the Executive branch and as a senior congressional staffer, will join Harvard Law School's Environmental Law Program in November as Executive Director.

At HLS in the Arts this past weekend, Paola Eisner ’19 exhibited a large still life that she painted before she went to college, and pages from a children’s book that she began working on before she started law school. Like these, many of the interests and projects that she pursues today have deeper roots.

A look back at 2016, highlights of the people who visited, events that took place and everyday life at Harvard Law School.

An op-ed by Jody Freeman: The stunning results of the 2016 election have prompted headlines suggesting that Trump will, with the help of the Republican Congress, dramatically reverse the Obama legacy on climate, energy and the environment. But how realistic is this threat? The short answer is: the picture is significantly more complicated, and markedly less bleak, than the headlines suggest.

Wendy Jacobs ’81, clinical professor and director of Harvard Law School’s Emmett Environmental Law and Policy Clinic, will lead the Living Lab Course and Research Project, which is designed to bring together students from across the University in interdisciplinary teams to develop innovative approaches for reducing greenhouse gas emissions at Harvard and beyond.

On April 1, Harvard Law School hosted a conference on 'Presidential Power in an Era of Polarized Conflict,' a daylong gathering in which experts from both sides of the aisle debated the president’s power in foreign and domestic affairs, and in issues of enforcement or non-enforcement.

Harvard students, faculty and fellows are training new high-tech instruments on Boston’s skies, searching for one well-known troublemaker and one escapee among the atmosphere’s invisible gases.

Two former EPA Administrators, who served Republican Presidents, William D. Ruckelshaus and William K. Reilly, filed a friend of the court brief supporting the Obama administration’s plan to cut carbon emissions from power plants. EPA’s Clean Power Plan is being challenged in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals by a coalition of State and industry opponents. This week, EPA filed its response to the legal challenge, and a number of other briefs are being filed in support of the Administration.

Ten research projects driven by faculty collaborators across six Harvard Schools will share over $1 million in the second round of grants awarded by the Climate Change Solutions Fund, an initiative launched last year by President Drew Faust to encourage multidisciplinary research around climate change.