'J' Hamilton to shine spotlight on Minnesota's renewable energy leadership
Tue, March 27 2018, 11:30am
Conference Room ABC, Campus Club, Fourth Floor, Coffman Memorial Union
Thanks to smart state and corporate policies, Minnesota is home to almost 60,000 clean energy jobs across the state and is leading the nation in growing our economy while developing our renewable energy potential.
At UMRA’s March 27 luncheon, climate policy expert J. Drake Hamilton will describe the economic and environmental benefits to our state, as well as next steps for capitalizing on the emerging clean energy economy.
Hamilton’s responsibilities as science policy director of Fresh Energy (fresh-energy.org), a Twin Cities-based nonprofit, include scientific analysis and policy development of clean energy solutions to global warming that will maximize economic opportunities for all. She bridges daily the line between social and natural sciences.
Hamilton gives more than 50 invited presentations each year to civic and business organizations. Recent audiences have included the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 3M, Medtronic, Allina Health, Xcel Energy, Great River Energy, and UnitedHealth. She has also testified before the Minnesota Legislature on science-based energy policy proposals. Her work has been featured in numerous local and national media outlets.
A native of New York’s Hudson River Valley, Hamilton earned undergraduate and graduate degrees in physical geography at Dartmouth College and the University of Minnesota respectively, with a focus on climatology and water resources. She has worked as a water quality planner at the Metropolitan Council, modeling nonpoint source pollution mitigation in the Minnesota River, and as an assistant professor of geography and regional sciences at George Washington University. She was awarded a fellowship from the European Union to study climate policy in Europe. Mpls-St. Paul Magazine has named her “one of 100 Minnesotans who make things happen.”
In 2015, President Obama honored Hamilton at the White House for the work in Minnesota to grow the economy while spurring development of clean energy jobs. She has represented Fresh Energy at three U.N. global climate summits. Among her experiences in that capacity, she witnessed the final adoption of the Paris Agreement in December 2015. She brought Minnesota energy leadership to the global spotlight in 2017 by convening a panel of speakers at the 23rd annual Climate Change Conference in Bonn, Germany, at which representatives from the Dayton administration, the Minnesota legislature, and Target described the deep carbon reductions occurring in the U.S. heartland.
In her spare time Hamilton grows organic peaches, pears, plums, and apples, which have won blue ribbons at the Minnesota State Fair.
— Chip Peterson, UMRA president
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