James Kneebone is an Affiliated Researcher at the Florence School of Regulation for the ‘Molecules and Materials’ area. He is a specialist in European hydrogen policy and the broader design of energy policy. James’s recent publications have covered infrastructure planning for hydrogen transportation and financing mechanisms for hydrogen, whilst his current work increasingly focuses on the evolution of the European energy policy paradigm. Prior to joining the FSR, James worked in DG ENER of the European Commission, where his primary areas of work were security of energy supply and the EU Methane Strategy.

James is also a PhD researcher at ETH Zürich in the Group for Sustainability and Technology (D-MTEC). He holds an MSc in International Development from Utrecht University and a BSc in Liberal Arts and Sciences from University College Maastricht. James also has ethnographic fieldwork experience from Havana, Cuba, and will conduct fieldwork in Germany during 2026 as part of a scholarship with the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD).

Lucila de Almeida is Part-time Professor at the European University, being affiliated to the Florence School of Regulation at the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies since 2020. At EUI/RSCAS/FSR, Lucila has taken on the role of principal investigator or task leader in several externally funded major research projects, including the European Commission (2025, EC Study on Consumer rights and protection in innovative energy services), Horizon Europe (2024-2028, U2Demo – Use of open-source P2P energy sharing platforms for energy democratisation), the International Energy Agency (2019-2025, UserTCP Global Observatory on P2P, Community Self-consumption, and Transactive Energy Models). Besides the research projects, Lucila is involved in several executive trainings and policy debates at EUI/RSCAS/FSR. Her primary field of research is energy law, with a focus on its private law dimension, including contracts in local, retail and wholesale markets, consumer law, and market integrity (REMIT).

Lucila is also an Associate Professor at NOVA University of Lisbon, NOVSA School of Law, holding the Abreu Chair in ESG Impact, Climate and Energy Law, and coordinating their master’s in international and European Law, and the NOVA Green Lab. She has also been an invited professor at FGV-Rio since 2025. She holds a PhD and an LLM in EU Law from the European University Institute and has licenses to practice law in Portugal and Brazil.

Before joining the faculty at NOVA, Lucila has been a tenured Assistant Professor at Wageningen University & Research (2020-2022), Edmond J. Safra Research Fellow at the Centre for Ethics at Tel Aviv University (2019-2020), postdoctoral researcher at the Faculty of Law at the University of Helsinki (2017-2019), visiting professor at Università Degli Studi di Padova (2019), and visiting researcher at Louvain Global College Law, UCLouvain (2017).

Lucila is a member of the editorial boards, serving as Associate Editor of Competition and Regulation in Network Industries (Sage Publishing) and editor of Energy Research & Social Science (Elsevier). Her work to date has resulted in numerous publications in international journals such as Yearbook of European Law and Yearbook of International Environmental Law (Oxford Journal), Energy Policy (Elsevier), Transnational Environmental Law (Cambridge Journal), RECIEL (Wiley), and books published with Hart Publishing, Edward Elgar and Springer.

Antonio Pistilli is a full-stack developer and solution architect at the European University Institute. He holds a degree in Computer Science and focuses on the design and delivery of scalable, data-driven digital platforms.

His work combines software engineering with strategic thinking, contributing to the definition of digital architectures that support research, knowledge dissemination, and policy-oriented activities. He is involved in shaping end-to-end systems, from data ingestion and processing pipelines to user-facing applications, with particular attention to performance, maintainability, and long-term sustainability.

His technical interests include cloud-based architectures, AI-driven document analysis, Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) systems, and data visualization, with a strong focus on translating complex requirements into effective and robust digital solutions.

Nicolò Rossetto is a Research Fellow at the Florence School of Regulation (FSR), where he has led the electricity research team since 2022 and is co-director of the course on Getting to Net Zero. Since he first joined the FSR in 2016, Nicolò has contributed to several research projects on energy regulation and markets, financed by both public and private entities.

Nicolò holds a master’s degree in international economics, policies and institutions from the University of Pavia (Italy), and a PhD in Economics, Law and Institutions from the IUSS of the same city. Before joining the FSR in 2016, Nicolò was an external advisor to the World Bank, a founding member of the Energy Watch at ISPI (Milano, Italy) and a teaching assistant at the Università di Pavia, where he currently teaches a post-graduate course on the Economics and Management of the Energy Industry.

His research interests span from the regulation of network industries to European energy policy, from energy security to the economics of electricity markets. He is a reviewer for several academic journals, such as Utilities Policy, Energy Economics, Energy Sources, Energy Efficiency, and EEEP.

Tim is a Part-time Assistant Professor at the Florence School of Regulation. He is also a Senior Director at FTI Consulting in London working on projects related to power market design and regulation across the globe. He is affiliated to the MIT Energy Initiative (MITEI) and the MIT Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research (CEEPR). Previously he was a Senior Lecturer at the MIT Sloan School of Management where he instructed the course “Engineering, Economics and Regulation of the Electric Power Sector”, a Research Scientist at the MITEI and a Research Fellow at FSR. He graduated as an engineer from Ghent University, Belgium and completed the EMIN program, an international master programme in economics. He holds a PhD in energy economics from University Paris-Sud XI.

Daniela Bernardo is Head of Sector for Executive Education at the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies (RSCAS) at the European University Institute. She holds a degree in Communication Technologies from the University of Aveiro, Portugal. With over 15 years of professional experience, she brings together expertise in executive education, digital learning design, and strategic programme coordination.

She leads the development and delivery of executive training initiatives, working closely with academics, experts, and institutional partners to design high-quality learning experiences that support professional development, policy dialogue, and capacity building across sectors.

Since 2014, Chiara Canestrini has been the Communications Specialist of the Florence School of Regulation with a strong focus on communication strategy and tools to enhance online learning.

She holds a Master’s degree in Philosophy and she has been working as a Copywriter, Web Editor and Social Media Manager since 2011. Chiara has more than seven years of experience in online training and live events (course facilitation, design of new online formats, community engagement).

Elena is an Executive Training Officer at the Florence School of Regulation. She works on the design, organisation, and implementation of executive training programmes, collaborating with academic experts and international partners to deliver high-quality learning experiences. She also contributes to stakeholder engagement and strategic communication initiatives to enhance the visibility and impact of FSR training activities.

She holds a Master’s degree in International Relations and European Studies from the University of Florence. During her academic career, she specialised in subjects related to energy and environmental policies. The passion for this field led her to work as a communication officer and event coordinator in the energy consultancy sector. Her previous professional experience includes working in journalism in Brussels, as well as in event and training management in Vienna and Florence.

From 1982 until 1994 Sergio Ascari was research assistant, research director and lecturer in Energy and Environmental Economics at the Institute of Energy Economics at Bocconi University, Milan and at the University of Pavia.

Between 1997 and 2006 he worked at the Italian Regulatory Authority for Electricity where he was in charge of Gas Tariffs, Environmental Affairs and later of International Co-operation. He has worked extensively for the promotion and harmonisation of Energy Regulation, notably in the Czech Republic, Lithuania, Turkey, and Ukraine.

From 2007 to 2009 he was Gas Expert in the Regulatory Section of the Energy Community Secretariat in Vienna. Since January 2009 he is a Senior Consultant with REF (Ricerche per l’Economia e la Finanza), Milan, Italy and collaborates on several national and international research and assistance projects, mainly in the gas sector.

Sergio graduated in Economics at the University of Pavia and holds a M.Sc. (Econ.) from the University of York.

Sofia Nicolai is research associate in the FSR energy research team in electricity regulation and policy. Currently, her main research interests are Regulation (EU) No 1227/2011 on wholesale energy market integrity and transparency (REMIT) and energy consumers’ data sharing for flexibility services in the context of project EDDIE (European Distributed Data Infrastructure for Energy). She is also a PhD candidate in EU law at the University of Bologna. Before joining FSR in January 2022, she was a trainee in the electricity department at the European Union Agency for the Cooperation of Energy Regulators (ACER), working in the electricity wholesale market monitoring team. She graduated in law from Bologna University, Italy and completed the Master in Sustainability and Energy Management at Bocconi University.