Yana Popkostova – Keynote Speaker

Yana Popkostova is the founder of the European Centre for Energy and Geopolitical Analysis [ECEGA]. Her policy work explores the evolving landscape of risks associated with the low-carbon transition, building tailored corporate and regulatory anticipatory foresight for agile risk management to particularly geopolitical, governance and commodities volatility, but also resource scarcities, and climate-enhanced security concerns. She advises international organisations, the diplomatic corps, as well as C-suite and corporate boardrooms.

In 2021, Popkostova was engaged by the EU Institute for Security Studies [EUISS] to spearhead the Institute’s Energy, Climate and Environmental Security portfolio and enhance the EU’s analytical capacity and foresight in this domain. In this capacity, she has investigated the compound security challenges posed by climate change and environmental degradation, focusing on mechanisms to mitigate and prevent impacts on European security and foreign policy. In the context of the Ukraine war, Popkostova has provided regular testimony and consulted the EEAS services and the HR/VP cabinet on the evolving sanctions regime against the Russian Federation [energy aspects], on the design of energy security strategies, including energy diplomacy doctrines [EU strategies on economic security and international energy engagement] and on positioning during multilateral negotiations [EU-AU Summit; EU-US Energy Council].

Yana Popkostova’s background is in the EU Energy policy incubator. She has previously worked on energy policy and strategy for the European Climate Foundation; and as a policy advisor within the cabinet of the Vice-President of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe, and DG Presidency in the European Parliament. She served as an expert reviewer for the landmark IPCC 1.5˚C and IRENA’s Geopolitics of Critical Materials reports. Yana Popkostova has received numerous accolades throughout her career. In 2017, she was designated as one of the 35-under-35 Future Energy Leaders by the World Energy Council. Popkostova is also a recipient of the prestigious EUI Policy Leaders Fellowship on Transnational Energy Governance. She was featured as amongst the Alumni that make a difference by the London School of Economics in 2020.

Yana Popkostova serves on the advisory board of the World Energy and Meteorology Council [WEMC] and as an expert at the World Energy Council’s NET-ZERO working group. She is a member of the UNDP Advisory Group on Energy Governance and the appointed co-lead of the UNDP Critical Minerals work stream. She has published widely and is a highly requested speaker on global energy transformations, geopolitics of energy, cross-commodity market trends and net-zero strategies. Her latest appearances as a keynote speaker include, inter alia, the OSCE Security of Energy Infrastructure hearing 2023; the EU Ambassadors Annual Conference 2022; the DAKAR Forum on Peace and Security 2021; UAE Energy Forum 2021; the World Energy Congress in Abu Dhabi. She has equally delivered expert addresses at the Global LNG Forum, the Paris Peace Forum, and the Global Hydrogen Forum amongst others. Yana Popkostova is trilingual and holds a postgraduate degree with distinction from the London School of
Economics.