Dr Thomas L Muinzer FRSA
Thomas L Muinzer
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Dr Thomas L Muinzer is from Northern Ireland, and undertook his qualifying law degree and other legal qualifications at Queen's University Belfast. He is Reader in Energy Transition Law at the University of Aberdeen.
His research, consultancy, teaching and speaking focuses most particularly on climate law and policy.
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He is the author of the first book on the world’s first example of national framework climate legislation, the UK’s Climate Change Act: Climate and Energy Governance for the UK Low Carbon Transition: The Climate Change Act 2008 (Palgrave: UK, 2018). He is also Contributing Editor of the first book-length study of national Climate Change Acts from around the world: National Climate Change Acts: The Emergence, Form and Nature of National Framework Climate Legislation (Hart/Bloomsbury: UK, 2021). His books Major Cases in Climate Litigation and Energy Law and the Sustainable Development Goals are forthcoming in 2024.
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Dr Muinzer is a member of a number of professional bodies. He is a Council Member of An Taisce (Ireland’s National Trust), sits on the Law Society of Scotland’s Education and Training (Policy) Committee and its Education and Training (Standard Setting) Sub-Committee, is a Founder Member of the Scottish Climate Emergency Legal Network, a Senator at the University of Aberdeen, and for the past seven years has been Co-Convenor of the Energy Law Section of the Society of Legal Scholars, UK.
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Dr Muinzer served a three-year term as Co-Director of the Aberdeen University Centre for Energy Law, the largest energy-focused research centre in the academic sector in the British Isles (October 2020-September 2023).
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Dr Muinzer has received research funding from the UK Government, the Northern Irish Government, the European Climate Foundation, the European Commission, the Global Challenges Research Fund, and the Royal Town Planning Institute.
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He has been involved in an advisory capacity with a range of energy, environmental and other actors, including NGOs and governmental bodies.
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After receiving his Doctorate in 2015, Thomas taught in the Law School and the Planning Department at Queen’s University, then was appointed Lecturer in Law at Stirling University, Scotland, where he was Co-Director of the Law School’s major dual-stream LLM/MSc Masters programme (2016-2018). He was subsequently Lecturer in Energy Law at ‘CEPMLP’, the University of Dundee’s Centre for Petroleum, Mineral Law and Policy (2018-2020). In 2020 he joined the Law School at the University of Aberdeen as Senior Lecturer in Energy Transition Law, and was promoted to Reader in Energy Transition Law with effect from 1 August 2022. He has significant in-house placement experience at a large commercial law firm.
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