Morgan Bazilian
Morgan D. Bazilian is an American-Irish academic, who has spent the majority of his career as a diplomat and in public service. He is the Director of the Payne Institute for Public Policy, and a professor of public policy at the Colorado School of Mines. His research focuses on energy and climate change policy, national security, and international affairs. In 2019, he was asked to testify in front of the U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources as an expert witness. Education. Bazilian has a bachelor's degree from the University of Michigan (1991), a master 's in Building Energy Analysis from the University of Colorado (1999), a master's in Applied Physics from Murdoch University (2001), and a Ph.D. in Energy Systems and Thermodynamics from University of New South Wales (2002). Career. In 2001, Bazilian was a Fulbright Fellow at SINTEF in Norway. From 2002 to 2007, Bazilian served as the Head of Energy Policy and Climate Change at the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland. Following this, he became a political appointee and Senior Advisor on Energy and Climate to the Irish Ministry of Energy under Eamon Ryan. In 2008, Bazilian was the lead negotiator  for the European Union on technology at the UNFCCC climate negotiations. In 2009, he became Special Advisor on International Energy Issues to the Director-general of UNIDO, and helped to develop the United Nations Sustainable Energy For All Initiative while leading the UN-Energy program. In 2011, he began serving as the Deputy Director of the Joint Institute on Strategic Energy Analysis at the U.S. National Renewable Energy Laboratory. From 2014 to 2018, he was the World Bank's Lead Energy Specialist. He is currently a Professor of Public Policy at the Colorado School of Mines, and is the inaugural  Director of the Payne Institute for Public Policy. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the World Economic Forum’s Global Advisory Council on Energy, and the Global Advisory Council of the Sustainable Finance Programme at Oxford University. He holds or has held academic affiliations at IIASA, University of Cambridge, and Columbia University. In 2021, he was appointed to Ireland's Climate Change Advisory Council. Prior to his career in energy and environmental policy, Bazilian was a professional mountain guide on Mount Rainier and Denali for both Rainier Mountaineering and International Mountain Guides. He is a published  poet and short story writer who was named "Poet of the low-carbon transition" by Michael Liebreich.