Derek Walker

Work

Derek Walker is Director of Strategic Climate Initiatives at Environmental Defense Fund (EDF). 

He has primary responsibility for directing state and regional climate change programs in the United States. He also manages initiatives at the intersection of international and domestic policy and coordinates EDF’s work on electric utility policy and engagement.  

Previously, Walker was Director of EDF’s California Climate Initiative and Deputy Director of EDF’s States Climate Program.  In that role, he managed implementation of California’s Global Warming Solutions Act (AB32) and helped lead successful campaigns to pass statewide greenhouse gas policies in New Jersey and Connecticut and to strengthen the Western Climate Initiative (WCI) regional cap-and-trade program. He has testified on climate change legislation before several state legislatures and state and federal regulatory bodies.

Walker is an accomplished speaker on climate change and energy issues.  He has made presentations at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) conference in Bali, Indonesia (December 2007); the Governor’s Climate and Forests Task Force meeting in Belem, Brazil (June 2009); the Harvard Electricity Policy Group Plenary in Santa Monica, CA (March 2010); and the California State Senate Select Committee on the Environment, the Economy and Climate Change field hearing in Los Angeles, CA (August 2010).  In April and May 2010, he conducted briefings on energy efficiency policy for senior members of the Vietnamese Parliament and senior officials of Vietnamese federal and provincial regulatory agencies in Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, and Danang, Vietnam.  

He serves on the Steering Committee of the Bay Area Climate Collaborative, the Board of Directors of the Clean Power Campaign, and is a former member of Smart Grid Consumer Collaborative Research Committee.  He co-chairs EDF’s Diversity Committee and is on the senior leadership team of EDF’s Climate & Air Program.

Background

Prior to joining EDF, Walker was Executive Director of the Maryland Democratic Party and was trained on the science of and solutions for global warming by former Vice President Al Gore and The Climate Project.  He studied politics and English at the College of William and Mary in Virginia and at University College, Oxford.