MIT Sloane School of Management, May 2021
Energy justice is garnering amplification under the Biden administration as policymakers confront vast demographic discrepancies in access to clean energy, ability to pay heating bills, proximity to polluted air, vulnerability to natural disasters, and more. Shalanda Baker is the new (and first-ever) deputy director of energy justice at the U.S. Department of Energy, where she works at the crossroads of environmental policy and racial justice to diminish those gaps.
Baker is also the author of “Revolutionary Power: An Activist’s Guide to the Energy Transition,” a former professor of law and public policy at Northeastern University, and co-founder of the Initiative for Energy Justice.
We talked with Baker about the importance of finding space and silence, either on a walk or when working, and the big idea of transforming how a U.S. cabinet department operates.
