Associate Professor of Human Rights, European and Environmental Law at the University of Surrey and co-director at the Surrey Centre for International and Environmental Law (SCIEL).
Dr Noreen O’Meara is Associate Professor of Human Rights, European and Environmental Law. She is co-director of the Surrey Centre for International and Environmental Law (SCIEL) and governance lead at the Governing Plastics Network.
With a background in legal practice in the EU institutions (European Commission and CJEU), Noreen has 14 years experience in academia. Through background expertise in international human rights law and EU law, she has developed substantial expertise on environmental governance: specifically on addressing plastics pollution at national, regional and global levels.
Her published research on plastics governance includes: the implementation of the Single-Use Plastics Directive in the EU and UK (O’Meara 2020); the Global Plastics Treaty Negotiations (O’Meara 2023); and Human Rights in the Global Plastics Treaty – implications for climate, ecosystems and human health (O’Meara 2023). She participated as an academic observer at INC-2 and plans to attend INC-4 and INC-5.
As the governance research lead at the Governing Plastics Network led by the Universities of Surrey and Nairobi, she has a track-record as PI and CO-I on interdisciplinary projects (funders: UKRI/GCRF, EPSRC, ESRC, UGPN, the British Academy and the UN Environment Programme (UNEP)). Through the Governing Plastics Network, Noreen’s project research on plastics governance has focused especially on East Africa and the Caribbean, Brazil and Australia.
Her latest research project is leading a study on legal and policy instruments to address plastics pollution (commissioned by UNEP). Further current research projects examine global trade and plastics waste, and intersections between human rights and environmental pollution.
