Uma Outka

Professor Uma Outka works at the intersection of energy law and environmental law. Her scholarship explores the legal context for energy transitions, with particular interests in energy and environmental justice, renewable energy, electricity regulation and decarbonization of the electric grid.

Outka joined the KU Law faculty in 2011 and served as associate dean for faculty from 2019-22. She is an affiliate faculty member of KU's Environmental Studies Program, Center for Environmental Policy, and Institute for Policy and Social Research. Her scholarship has appeared in book chapters and law journals, including Ecology Law Quarterly, Stanford Environmental Law Journal, Wake Forest University Law Review, and Vanderbilt Law Review. She is an American Bar Foundation Fellow and was elected to the American Law Institute in 2022. In recognition of her scholarly record, she held the R. Scott Law Professorship from 2019 to 2026. In 2026, she was named the Leo S. Brenneisen Distinguished Professor of Law. 

At KU Law, Outka teaches courses in environmental law, property, energy law, environmental justice and climate change law and policy, and she has also had the opportunity to teach in other settings. She has served as a visiting professor at the Washington University in St. Louis School of Law (2022), as a distinguished scholar in residence at the University of Hawaii's Summer Environmental Law Program (2019) and as a visiting professor at the Rajiv Gandhi School of Intellectual Property Law, Indian Institute of Technology-Kharagpur, India (2018). She has twice been recognized by the KU Law student body with the Moreau Faculty Award (in 2013 and 2026) and by the law school with the Immel Award for Teaching Excellence (2019). In 2022-23, she served as chair of the Energy and Natural Resources Law Section of the American Association of Law Schools.

Before coming to KU Law, Outka spent two years as a visiting scholar in Energy and Land Use Law at the Florida State University College of Law. Outka previously served as general counsel for 1000 Friends of Florida, a non-profit advocacy organization focused on growth management, environmental conservation and affordable housing, and worked as an attorney in the litigation group with the New England law firm, Verrill Dana, LLP in Portland, Maine. She is a summa cum laude graduate of the University of Maine School of Law and holds a Masters in Public Policy and Management from the Muskie School of Public Service.