Associate Professor in International, Environmental and Energy Law, Aalborg University.

Non-resident Research Fellow at the Institute for Security and Development Policy in Stockholm.

She was appointed Lead Author on Environmental Governance and Polar Regions (Arctic and Antarctic) at the International Panel of Climate Change (IPCC) United Nations. She is specialized in environmental damage and liability problems in a multilevel context. Her expertise is on environmental regime effectiveness in a multi-level governance perspective. Included in her areas of interests are human rights, law of the sea (UNCLOS), and environmental security (particularly that of the Arctic Ocean), Energy Security and Geopolitics. Though a legal scholar, her approach is interdisciplinary, combining law with international relations, economics, and elements of (climate) environmental science. Sandra is also Adjunt Professor of Law, School of Law, Western Sydney University (Sydney, Australia), Fellow at the Sustainability College Bruges – SCB (Belgium), Expert Research Fellow at the Institute for Security and Development Policy, ISDP working on the Sino-Arctic Research Programme (Stockholm, Sweden), Member of the Governamental Panel of Assessemnt for the Academy of Finland for Governamental Projects on Environmental Law and Economcis and Expert at the European Commission (DG Clima Adaptation) and the European Parliament.

Dr. Cassotta was born and raised in Brussels. She holds a B.A. in language from the European School of Brussels (Uccle), an M.S. in political science from the State University of Milan (Italy), and Ph.D. in international environmental law from Aarhus University (Denmark). She worked for 14 years in the private and public sectors, and worked as media press and information officer at the International Olive Oil Council (United Nations aegis) for several years in Madrid (Spain), writing press releases, session reports of intergovernmental meetings, and official briefings for the executive director.