Thomas Klug is a doctoral researcher who joined RD5 and the CERES Project in November 2022. Their research focuses on the political economy of fossil fuel phaseout, just transitions finance and gender equity. They are part of the Climate Policy and Development working group in Berlin. They are co-leading two research projects CSSN projects funded by Brown University on corporate climate obstruction and just transitions finance. They currently employ mostly qualitative methods, including qualitative synthesis, content analysis, semi-structured interviews, and mixed-methods text analyses in their research.
Prior to joining PIK, they earned their bachelor’s degrees in Public Policy Studies and Environmental Science from Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. They also worked as a Research Associate at the Sanford School of Public Policy, coordinating the Sustainable Energy Transitions Initiative (SETI) Network. During that time, they worked on research regarding Ethiopia's electricity tariff policy, ECOWAS's Policy for Gender Mainstreaming in Energy Access, the gender and energy access nexus, and coal phaseout in Chile.
Department
Contact
14412 Potsdam
ORCID
- Political economy of climate policy
- Just transitions
- Climate finance
- Gender
- Corporate climate obstruction
- Qualitative methods
Meles, T. H., Mekonnen, A., Beyene, A. D., Hassen, S., Pattanayak, S. K., Sebsibie, S., Klug, T., & Jeuland, M. (2021). Households' valuation of power outages in major cities of Ethiopia: An application of stated preference methods. Energy Economics, 102, 105527.
Hassen, S., Beyene, A.D., Jeuland, M., Mekonnen, A., Meles, T.H., Sebsibie, S., Klug, T., Pattanayak, S.K. and Toman, M.A. (2022). Effect of electricity price reform on households’ electricity consumption in urban Ethiopia. Utilities Policy, 79, 101445.
DeStephano, P., Perez, B. H., Minoletti, C. H., Klug, T., & Plutshack, V. (2022). Market-based approaches, civil society and the role of the state in Chile’s coal phase-out. The Political Economy of Coal: Obstacles to Clean Energy Transitions.
Klug, T., Beyene, A. D., Meles, T. H., Toman, M., Hassen, S., Hou, M., ... & Jeuland, M. (2022). A Review of Impacts of Electricity Tariff Reform in Africa. Energy Policy.
Das, I., Klug, T., Krishnapriya, P., Plutshack, V., Saparapa, R., Scott, S., Sills, E., Jeuland, M., Kara, N., & Pattanayak, S. K. (2023). Frameworks, methods and evidence connecting modern domestic energy services and gender empowerment. Nature Energy, 8(5), 435-449.
Klug, T., Saparapa, S., Plutshack, V. (2024). The political economy of gender mainstreaming in energy access in Senegal. Environmental Research: Climate
Appiah, S., Plutshack, V., Klug, T., Agradi, M., Nunoo, I., Saparapa, R. (2024) “Without the full involvement of women democracy cannot work well”: The political economy of gender mainstreaming in energy access in Sierra Leone. Environmental Research: Climate
Meles, T. H., Mekonnen, A., Jeuland, M., Beyene, A. D., Klug, T., Hassen, S., ... & Pattanayak, S. K. (2025). Does the payment vehicle matter for valuing improved electricity reliability? A discrete choice experiment in Ethiopia. Utilities Policy, 93, 101893.
Nunoo, I., Klug, T., Plutshack, V., Agradi, M., Appiah, S., & Saparapa, R. (2025) The political economy of Kenya’s 2019 gender policy in energy access. Energy Research & Social Science
- Consensus or Cheap Talk? The Discursive Politics of South Africa’s Just Energy Transition
- Preferences for just transitions: A systematic review
- Dealing in decarbonisation? The political economy of Senegal's Just Energy Transition Partnership
- Peddling false solutions? Corporate low-carbon projects and climate delay strategies
