Lena Kilian

About

I am a postdoctoral researcher at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research. My work looks at transformation pathways to meet the Sustainable Development Goals and to safeguard Planetary Boundaries.

Until March 2025, I was a Research Fellow in Consumption-Based Accounting at the Sustainability Research Institute at the University of Leeds. Here, I looked at estimating and analysing consumption-based emissions, with a focus on analysing household emissions. Moreover, I worked on the UK’s model to estimate consumption-based emissions, which is used to calculate the UK’s carbon footprint.

Before this, I completed an ESRC-funded 2+2 MSc + PhD programme at the University of Leeds as part of the ESRC-funded Data Analytics and Society CDT. The focus of my PhD research was on consumption-based emissions of UK households. In addition to this I have an MSc from King’s College London in Sustainable Cities and a BSc from the University of Glasgow in Psychology with Sociology. More information about my background can be found here.