LSU Law Professor Keith Hall has been appointed the Nesser Family Chair in Energy Law, becoming first faculty member to hold the chair at the Paul M. Hebert Law Center.
“It’s an honor to be named the inaugural Nesser Family Chair in Energy Law,” said Professor Hall. “Being appointed to a chair is wonderful in itself, but it is a special privilege to be named to this particular chair and have my name associated with the Nessers because they are such wonderful people and have been so supportive of LSU Law in many ways.”
Hall joined the LSU Law faculty as an assistant professor in 2012, was promoted to associate professor in 2015, and was appointed to full professor and awarded tenure in 2018. He has served as Director of the Louisiana Mineral Law Institute since 2012, and in early 2020 he was named Director of the LSU John P. Laborde Energy Law Center.
“Since joining our faculty, Professor Hall has been instrumental in expanding and enhancing the LSU Law energy law program, which has had a significant impact for our students,” said LSU Law Interim Dean Lee Ann Wheelis Lockridge. “Both his extensive expertise and his engagement with the students help prepare our students for careers in fields that are of particular importance to our state and region, and they make him a perfect fit for this appointment.”
Hall is a frequent speaker at national and international conferences on oil and gas, energy, mineral rights, and environmental law, and he has also served as a consultant and expert witness on oil and gas matters in numerous states. He regularly publishes on a range of topics in energy law, mineral rights, and the oil and gas exploration field; he is co-author of one of the two national casebooks on oil and gas law, and he is also the co-author of a book on the legal issues relating to hydraulic fracturing.
At LSU Law, Hall is the leading member of the energy law faculty and he currently teaches two of the four required courses in the law school’s Graduate Certificate in Energy Law and Policy. He also supervises the certificate program. The courses he has taught include Energy Law & Regulation, Mineral Rights, Advanced Mineral Law, International Petroleum Transactions, and Civil Law Property. He regularly represents LSU Law nationally and internationally as a guest lecturer at academic and professional conferences.
Prior to joining the LSU Law faculty, Hall was a member of the Stone Pigman Walther Wittmann law firm in New Orleans, where he practiced law for 16 years with a focus on oil and gas litigation and transactions, environmental law, and toxic tort litigation. Prior to that, he worked for eight years as a chemical engineer. Hall earned a B.S. in chemical engineering at LSU in 1985 and graduated first in his class from the Loyola University School of Law in New Orleans in 1996.
Hall is very active with professional organizations in the energy field, including serving on the Rocky Mountain Mineral Law Foundation Board of Directors since 2020, the Institute for Energy Law Advisory Board since 2012, and the Energy & Mineral Law Foundation Executive Committee from 2018 to 2021. He has also served as editor-in-chief of the Institute for Energy Law’s Oil & Gas E-Report since 2018.
LSU Law alumnus John Nesser III (’73) said he is proud to see Hall become the inaugural holder of the endowed chair that his family created with a generous donation to LSU Law.
“We have every confidence Professor Hall is the right person to hold the Nesser Chair in Energy Law. He covers all the bases of expertise, participation, and reputation in Louisiana, nationally, and internationally, as demonstrated by his academic and professional record,” said Nesser, who was also instrumental in establishing the LSU Law Laborde Energy Law Center and has served as vice chairman since inception of the program in 2012.
“Law schools around the country are facing financial constraints, but financial support from the Nessers gives the LSU Law Laborde Energy Law Center the resources it needs to serve our students and make LSU’s Energy Law Center perhaps the strongest energy law program in the country,” said Hall.
