Prof. Alexandra B. Klass Named Distinguished McKnight University Professor

The Office of the Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost has announced that Professor Alexandra B. Klass has been named a Distinguished McKnight University Professor—one of just five University of Minnesota faculty members to receive the distinction this year. The Distinguished McKnight University Professorship program recognizes the University's "highest-achieving mid-career faculty who have recently attained full professor status... and whose accomplishments have brought great renown and prestige to Minnesota." Recipients hold the title "Distinguished McKnight University Professor" for as long as they remain at the University.

Klass joined the Law School faculty in 2006. She teaches and writes in the areas of energy law, environmental law, natural resources law, tort law, and property law. Her recent scholarly work, published in many of the nation's leading law journals, addresses such issues as regulatory challenges to integrating more renewable energy into the nation's electrical grid, oil and gas transportation infrastructure, and federal financial support for renewable energy development. She is a co-author of The Practice and Policy of Environmental Law (Foundation Press, third edition, 2014) and a co-author of Energy Law and Policy (West Academic Publishing, 2015). Klass was named the Stanley V. Kinyon Teacher of the Year for 2009-2010, and she served as associate dean for academic affairs from 2010-2012. She will be a visiting professor at Harvard Law School in the fall of 2015.

"Alex Klass is an outstanding scholar," said Dean David Wippman. "Her work at the intersection of energy, environmental, natural resources, and property law offers powerful new ways to think about the nation's regulatory approach to renewable energy and similar issues."

Prior to her teaching career, Klass was a partner at Dorsey & Whitney in Minneapolis, where she specialized in environmental law, natural resources, and land use cases. As a lawyer in private practice from 1993-2004, she handled cases in federal and state trial and appellate courts involving contaminated property, wetlands, environmental review, mining, environmental rights, zoning, eminent domain, and environmental torts. She continues to represent clients pro bono in cases involving environmental, natural resources, and energy law matters. She clerked for the Honorable Barbara B. Crabb, chief judge of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin, from 1992-1993.