Kavita Surana holds the BMIMI Endowed Professorship for Data-Driven Knowledge Generation: Climate Action and is a Professor of Data Ecosystems and Environmental Accountability at the Vienna University of Economics and Business (WU Vienna), Austria, where she leads the Institute for Data, Energy, and Sustainability. Her research focuses on climate and energy innovation, with an emphasis on the interactions between public policy, businesses, and technological change and their economic and environmental impacts at the local and global levels. Dr. Surana holds additional appointments as a Senior Fellow at the Center for Global Sustainability (CGS), University of Maryland College Park, USA and as Associate Faculty at Complexity Science Hub Vienna, Austria. 

Previously, she was an Assistant Research Professor at CGS and an Associate and Postdoctoral fellow in the Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard Kennedy School of Government. She has also worked in organizations such as the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission (CEA), the World Bank, ICF, and xista science ventures on various issues related to energy and climate innovation, public policy, and investments. Her research has been funded by the US National Science Foundation and Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and published in high-impact journals such as Nature Energy, Nature Climate Change, Joule, and Research Policy. She is the Associate Editor of the journal Energy and Climate Change. 

Dr. Surana holds a PhD in materials science and engineering from the Institut Polytechnique de Grenoble (INP-Grenoble / Université Grenoble-Alpes), France conducted jointly with the CEA. She holds an MS in materials for energy storage and conversion from Paul Sabatier University, Toulouse, France and a BSc in Physics from St. Stephen’s College, Delhi University, India. 

Research interests: 

• Climate change 

• Energy transitions 

• Technological change 

• Science, technology, and innovation policy 

• Climate and energy policy 

• Environmental sustainability 

Further information on publications and projects can be found here: PURE