Profile

Jean Monnet Chaired Professor of European and International Economic Law, Alfaisal University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, where he teaches public international law, international economic law, climate change law and policy, international trade law, Research Methods, and EU external relations law. Prior to joining Alfaisal University in 2022, he was Full Professor of Law and the Director of Research at the Centre for Commercial Law Studies of Queen Mary University of London.

He has served in the Energy Community Secretariat, the Energy Charter Secretariat, the World Trade Organization, and several EU institutions (EU Commission, EU Parliament, EU Council, EU Court of Justice). He is the author of more than 220 scholarly publications on international trade and WTO law, climate change law, energy governance, EU law, international investment law and the interaction among them in American and European law reviews such as the Yale Journal of International Affairs, Georgetown Journal of International Law, Columbia Journal of European Law, Fordham International Law Journal, Chicago Journal of International Law, Legal Issues of Economic Integration, European Foreign Affairs Review, and Journal of World Energy Law and Business (Oxford University Press).

Among his publications are the books Electricity Decentralization in the European Union: Towards zero carbon and energy transition, 2^nd edition (Oxford: Elsevier, 2023), International Trade Relations of the European Union: A Legal and Policy Analysis (Palgrave Macmillan, 2022), International Trade and Sustainability: Perspectives from Developing and Developed Countries (Palgrave Macmillan, 2022), Climate Clubs for a Sustainable Future: The role of international trade and investment law (Kluwer Law International, 2021), The Great Energy Transition in the European Union, Volume 1 (Eliva Press, 2020), The Great Energy Transition in the European Union, Volume 2 (Eliva Press, 2020), Solutions for Sustainability: How the international trade, energy and climate change regimes can help (Springer, 2019), EU Trade Law (Edward Elgar, 2019), Energy Security, Trade and the EU: Regional and International Perspectives (Edward Elgar, 2016), The European Energy Union (Claeys & Casteels Publishing, 2016), Energy Security, Trade and the EU: Regional and International Perspectives (Elgar, forthcoming 2016), International Energy Governance: Selected Legal Issues (Elgar, 2014), Climate Change and International Trade (Elgar, 2013), International Trade and Investment Law: Multilateral, Regional and Bilateral Governance (Elgar, 2010), and Theory and Practice of EC External Trade Law and Policy (Cameron May, 2008). Rafael's work has been cited by United States District Courts and scientific bodies such as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change .

Since 2010, Rafael has been awarded several major multi-year grants, most recently a €14-million research grant as part of a consortium on smart grids funded by the EU Commission's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program, where he was the Principal Investigator and manager of 20 researchers with a multi-year budget of around €700,000 for my research team.

In 2016, Rafel provided expert advice to the House of Lords on post-Brexit EU-UK trade agreements. In August 2021, he provided written evidence to the International Trade Committee of the House of Commons on the connections between climate change and international trade. In November 2021, Rafael was invited to provide expert advice to the Irish National Parliament's Joint Committee on Environment and Climate Action in relation to the Energy Charter Treaty, energy security, and liquefied natural gas. In March 2022, Chair Gary Sambrook MP for Birmingham Northfield and Co-Chair Lord Waverley of the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) invited Rafael to provide submissions of expert evidence for their first report of 2022 on cutting trade costs, tackling the trade finance gap, boosting SME growth in the Commonwealth. The APPG for Trade and Investment is a cross-party and politically impartial parliamentary forum and includes parliamentarians from both houses of the UK Parliament and all geographic regions of the United Kingdom. Rafael is invited regularly to provide his expertise to think tanks such as Chatham House or the Mercator Research Institute on Global Commons and Climate Change.

Since 2022 (until 2029), Rafael serves as an expert for the UK's Department for International Trade's (DIT) Sustainability Thematic Working Group. This group provides expert advice and supports the UK Government with its trade and environment objectives through new trade agreements and as a fully independent member in the World Trade Organization. Since September 2022, Rafael serves as a member of the UK Trade and Sustainable Development Domestic Advisory Group for the Trade & Sustainable Development chapters of the UK's rest-of-world Free Trade Agreements, in the UK Department for International Trade.

Rafael has been a Global Research Fellow at New York University School of Law (Hauser Global Law School Program), Visiting Fellow at the World Trade Institute, Visiting Scholar at Georgetown University Law Center, Tillar House Resident Fellow at the American Society of International Law, Visiting Researcher at Harvard Law School and Fellow at the Real Colegio Complutense (Harvard University), Emile Noël Doctoral Fellow at New York University School of Law, Fellow at the Australian National University, and Visiting Scholar at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Law School.

He is the Editor-in-Chief of Renewable Energy Law and Policy Review and received his graduate legal education at Stanford Law School, Columbia Law School, the London School of Economics and Political Science, and the European University Institute (Florence).