Michael B. Gerrard is Andrew Sabin Professor of Professional Practice at Columbia Law School and founder and faculty director of its Sabin Center for Climate Change Law. He teaches courses on environmental law, energy regulation and climate change law. He chaired the faculty of Columbia's Earth Institute and holds a joint appointment to the faculty of its successor, the Columbia Climate School. Until December 2008 he headed the New York City office of Arnold & Porter LLP and its environmental law practice; he is now Senior Counsel to the firm (now Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer LLP). He practiced environmental law full-time from 1979 through 2008.
He was 2004-2005 Chair of the American Bar Association‘s Section on Environment, Energy and Resources. He is also former Chair of the Environmental Law Section of the New York State Bar Association, and former Chair of the Executive Committee of the New York City Bar Association. He has served on the executive committees of the Environmental Law Institute and the American College of Environmental Lawyers.
He is General Editor of Matthew Bender‘s twelve-volume Environmental Law Practice Guide, which upon publication was selected as the “Best Law Book of the Year“ by the Association of American Publishers. He is the General Editor of Matthew Bender‘s four-volume publication Brownfields Law and Practice, winner of the 1998 “Best Law Book of the Year“ award. He is co-author of Matthew Bender‘s Environmental Impact Review in New York (with Daniel Ruzow and Philip Weinberg), author of Whose Backyard, Whose Risk: Fear and Fairness in Toxic and Nuclear Waste Siting (MIT 1994), editor of Matthew Bender‘s monthly newsletter Environmental Law in New York, and since 1986, co-author of the monthly environmental law column in the New York Law Journal. His other books are The Law of Environmental Justice (2nd ed. ABA 2008), Global Climate Change and U.S. Law (2nd ed. ABA 2014), The Law of Clean Energy: Efficiency and Renewables (ABA 2011), and The Law of Adaptation to Climate Change (ABA 2012). He has served as Deputy Director of the Mayor‘s Transit Office in New York City and Special Counsel to the Chair of the New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority.
He received his B.A. from Columbia University and his J.D. from New York University School of Law, where he was a Root Tilden Scholar.