Skip to main content.
Sam Panarella

administrator

Sam Panarella

Dean

Law School

Contact

508-985-1156

UMass School of Law 114

Education

1998Lewis & Clark Law SchoolJD
1995University of MontanaBA

Teaching

  • Climate Change Law
  • Contracts
  • Renewable Energy Law
  • Endangered Species
  • Environmental law

Programs

Research

Research awards

  • $ 75,000 awarded by Executive Office of the Trial Court for Justice Bridge Trial Court Agreement FY2024

Select publications

  • Sam Panarella, Ada Stepleton, Peter Yould (2022).
    Renewable Energy Development on State Trust Lands
    Duke Environmental Law & Policy Forum
  • Sam Panarella (2022).
    History of Federal Energy Regulation
    Law of Distributed Generation, American Bar Association
  • Sam Panarella, Sandi Zellmer, Oliver Wood (2020).
    Species Conservation and Recovery through Adequate Regulatory Mechanisms
    Harvard Environmental Law Review
  • Sam Panarella, Jody Lowenstein (2018).
    Troubled Water: Building a Bridge to Clean Energy through Small Hydropower Regulatory Reform
    UCLA Journal of Environmental Law & Policy
  • Sam Panarella (2017).
    A Bird in the Hand: Shotguns, Deadly Oil Pits, Cute Kittens, and the Migratory Bird Treaty Act
    University of Virginia Environmental Law Journal

Sam Panarella was appointed to serve as the Dean of UMass Law in 2023. Prior to his deanship, Dean Panarella was a Professor of Law at University of Montana School of Law and the Executive Director of the Max Baucus Institute at the University of Montana. His research and teaching interests include energy, climate change, environmental, and business law. His recent scholarship appears in Harvard Environmental Law Review, Duke Environmental Law & Policy Forum, UCLA Journal of Environmental Law & Policy, and University of Virginia Environmental Law Journal. Dean Panarella has extensive experience teaching and running legal programs in China and Europe.

Dean Panarella is a graduate of Lewis & Clark Law School. After law school, he served as a judicial clerk for the Honorable Otto R. Skopil, Jr. of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

    Back to top of screen