Research Expertise and Interest
environmental law, natural resources law, energy law, land-use law, federal Indian law, administrative law, property
Research Description
Eric Biber’s teaching and research interests are environmental law, natural resources law, energy law, land-use law, federal Indian law, administrative law, and property. Prior to joining Berkeley in 2006, he worked as a litigator in the Denver office of Earthjustice, a public-interest nonprofit organization specializing in public lands and other environmental cases. Biber taught public lands law as an adjunct faculty member at the University of Denver Sturm College of Law in fall 2005. He is a member of both the Colorado and California bars. He is the co-director of the Cannabis Research Center at UC Berkeley, which examines the environmental, regulatory, and economic implications of legalized cannabis production in California and elsewhere. He is also co-principal investigator for Getting It Right, a joint research project between Berkeley Law and the Columbia Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation; this project examines how local and state land-use and environmental regulations and litigation shape the approval of new housing in urban areas in California and elsewhere.
Biber earned a master’s of environmental science with a focus in conservation biology from the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies and a J.D. from Yale Law School. Following law school, Biber clerked for Judge Carlos Lucero of the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver and Judge Judith Rogers of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.
Biber’s scholarship has appeared in a wide range of law reviews, including the University of Chicago Law Review, UCLA Law Review, Georgetown Law Journal, Vanderbilt Law Review, University of Colorado Law Review, Harvard Environmental Law Review, Environmental Law, NYU Environmental Law Journal, and Administrative Law Review. Biber has published in several leading peer-reviewed natural science and social science journals, including Society and Natural Resources, Frontiers in Ecology and Environment, Ecography, and Science.
At Berkeley, Biber teaches courses in Property, Public Lands and Natural Resources Law, Biodiversity Law, Federal Indian Law, Energy Law, Land-Use Law, and Environmental Law and Policy. He also helps lead the Environmental Law Writing Seminar. He is the Director of the Environmental and Energy Law Programs at Berkeley.
