Levin College of Law
Welcome to UF LAW

Amy L. Stein

Cone, Wagner, Nugent, Hazouri & Roth Professor of Law
Professor of Law

CV

SSRN

bepress (SelectedWorks)

Phone:
(352) 273-0953

Expertise

Artificial Intelligence  • Climate Change  • Distributed Energy  • Electric Grid Reliability  • Energy  • Environmental Law  • Federalism  • Renewable Energy  • States Rights  • Sustainability  • Tenth Amendment  • 

About

Amy L. Stein is the Cone Wagner Professor of Law at the University of Florida Levin College of Law and affiliate faculty for the University’s AI2 Center, internationally recognized for her research on energy law and policy, as well as the intersection of artificial intelligence, energy, and environmental law. She serves on the University’s AI Working Group in AI Ethics and Policy and the Florida Climate Institute, as well as the Association of American Law Schools’ Natural Resources and Energy Law and Environmental Sections. Popular Science named Professor Stein one of the “Visionary Thinkers” of 2022 for her work on algorithms and the climate crisis.

Professor Stein’s work focuses on the intersection of emerging technologies and the environment. Recent work demonstrates how the future of AI is intricately tied to the clean energy transition, arguing for revised alignment between public and private law related to the electric grid, utilities, and Big Tech to facilitate both developments successfully (See Chapter 21 Generative AI and Sustainability in THE OXFORD HANDBOOK OF THE FOUNDATION AND REGULATION OF GENERATIVE AI (forthcoming Oxford University Press 2024)). Her work also demonstrates how antitrust laws can serve as a useful lever against public utilities resistant to sharing their energy data, “Rejecting Public Utility Data Monopolies”, 112 California Law Review 101 (forthcoming 2024); challenges unilateral presidential delegations to address energy emergencies, “Energy Emergencies,” 115 Northwestern University Law Review 799 (2020); demonstrates how new artificial intelligence techniques can assist in decarbonization strategies across the electric grid, “Artificial Intelligence and Climate Change,” Yale Law Journal on Regulation (2020); and provides legal strategies for decarbonizing the light-duty vehicle fleet, Chapter 14 (with Joshua Fershée) in LEGAL PATHWAYS TO DEEP DECARBONIZATION IN THE UNITED STATES (ELI Press, Michael B. Gerrard and John C. Dernbach eds) (2019). Prior scholarship focuses on emerging technologies and the environment, with a focus on electric grid governance, distributed energy resources, energy storage, reliability, federalism, and climate change, all of which can be accessed at http://ssrn.com/author=1216973. She teaches in the areas of energy law, environmental law, climate change, artificial intelligence, and torts, and she has presented her energy work across the country and internationally, in both academic and policy forums.

Professor Stein began her academic career at George Washington University Law School and Tulane Law School. Prior to her academic appointments, she practiced as an environmental and litigation associate for Latham & Watkins LLP in the firm’s Washington, D.C., and Silicon Valley offices. She is a member of the District of Columbia, Illinois, and California state bars and a graduate of the University of Chicago (AB) and the University of Chicago Law School (JD).

 

Education

J.D., University of Chicago
B.A., University of Chicago

Teaching and Scholarship

Energy, Environmental, Climate Change, Artificial Intelligence, Torts, Federalism, Administrative Law

 

Publications

Articles

  • Rejecting Regulated Data Monopolies, 112 Calif. L. Rev. (forthcoming 2024)
  • Domestic Emergency Pretexts, 98 Indiana L. J. 479 (2023) https://www.repository.law.indiana.edu/ilj/vol98/iss2/4/
  • Assuming the Risks of Artificial Intelligence, 102 B.U. L. Rev. (2022) https://www.bu.edu/bulawreview/files/2022/04/STEIN.pdf
  • Energy Emergencies, 115 Northwestern University Law Review 799 (2020) https://scholarlycommons.law.northwestern.edu/nulr/vol115/iss3/3/
  • Artificial Intelligence and Climate Change, 37 Yale Journal on Regulation 101 (2020) [SSRN]
  • A Statutory National Security President, 70 Florida Law Review 1191 (2018) [SSRN]
  • Regulating Reliability, 54 Houston Law Review 1191 (2017) [SSRN]
  • Breaking Energy Path Dependencies, 82 Brooklyn Law Review 559 (2017) [SSRN]
  • Distributed Reliability, 87 University of Colorado Law Review 887 (2016) [SSRN]
  • Reconsidering Regulatory Uncertainty: A Path Forward for Energy Storage, 41 Florida State University Law Review 697 (2014) [SSRN]
  • Renewable Energy Through Agency Action, 84 University of Colorado Law Review 651 (2013) [SSRN]
  • The Tipping Point of Federalism, 45 Connecticut Law Review 217 (2012) [SSRN]
  • Climate Change Under NEPA: Avoiding Cursory Consideration of Greenhouse Gases, 81 University of Colorado Law Review 473 (2010), [SSRN]
  • State Fish Stocking Programs at Risk: Takings Under the Endangered Species Act, 20 Duke Environmental Law & Policy Forum 63 (2010)

Book Chapters

Short Publications

University of Florida Levin College of Law
309 Village Drive
PO Box 117620
Gainesville, FL 32611
(352) 273-0804
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The Florida Constitutional Law Endowment in memory of Justice Ben F. Overton was created by Judge Karen Miller in 2013. This fund supports lectures and presentations by Justices of the Florida Supreme Court at the Fredric G. Levin College of Law.

HISTORY

Justice Overton, who earned his B.S. in 1951 and his Juris Doctor in 1952 from the University of Florida, was the first merit appointment to the Florida Supreme Court. Throughout his career he was active in legal education and served as an Adjunct Professor at the Levin College of Law through December 2012, the month of his death. Although he resided at Oak Hammock at the University of Florida, a continuing care retirement community developed in cooperation with UF, he also considered the Florida Supreme Court “home.” Among the high points of his later years was hosting Justices of the Florida Supreme Court in Gainesville and taking his class to Tallahassee to hear oral arguments at the Florida Supreme Court.
Judge Miller, who earned her B.S. cum laude from New York University in 1974 and her Juris Doctor from New York Law School in 1977, served as Chief Administrative Law Judge of the New York City Department of Consumer Affairs, New York City’s business regulatory agency, before she retired to Oak Hammock at the University of Florida. Having accompanied Justice Overton on his excursions to Tallahassee and joined him in welcoming guests to Oak Hammock at the University of Florida, she created the endowment in memory of Justice Overton to ensure that the Levin College of Law continues to have the funding necessary to continue and enhance the interaction between its students and the Florida Supreme Court.

 

Judge Miller remembered the event that motivated the endowment.

 

Prior to a dinner at the home of Dean Robert Jerry and Lisa Jerry shortly after Justice Overton’s death, Justice Barbara Pariente and I were discussing a suitable memorial. Justice Pariente, who had been Justice Overton’s colleague on the Florida Supreme Court and who understood the importance to him of the interaction between his students and the Court, suggested the outline of what has become the Overton lectures. Dean Jerry, who has since retired, as has Dean Emeritus Jon Mills, who assumed responsibility for implementing the Overton lectures, were very supportive from the beginning. Since Dean Mills’ retirement, Professor Timothy McClendon, who assisted both Justice Overton and Dean Mills teaching Florida Constitutional Law and who co-authored the recent Florida Constitutional Law casebook, has continued the Overton lectures with the support of Interim Dean Merritt McAlister and CGR director, Professor Danaya Wright.

Justice Overton was a devoted jurist, educator, and ethical leader of the Florida legal profession. The Overton Lecture Series brings Florida Supreme Court Justices to the University of Florida, Levin College of Law, and serves to introduce students to the inner workings of the Court. CGR and the students of the College of Law extend our deepest gratitude to Judge Karen Miller for making the Overton Lectures possible in perpetuity.

You can watch an interview for the Florida Historical Society by Mary Adkins, professor emeritus of the UF Levin College of Law, with Justice Overton here.

Justice Overton was also interviewed for the Samuel Proctor Oral History Project and a transcript of his interview is available at the Smathers Library, and here.
Justice Overton sat on the Constitution Revision Commission of 1977-78 that proposed a right to privacy in the Florida Constitution. Although it failed as part of the Constitution Revision Commission recommendations, it passed in 1980 when proposed by the legislature. The bill was co-sponsored by our very own Jon Mills. The privacy provision prevailed by greater than 60%. Justice Overton then wrote a concurrence in a critical reproductive rights case in 1989 affirming that the privacy provision of the Florida Constitution included the right to obtain an abortion. That decision was overruled in Planned Parenthood of SW and Central Florida v. Florida. You can read about the role of Justice Overton, Jon Mills – director emeritus of CGR, and the history of the 1989 case here.