Shalanda Baker, a Northeastern law professor who has been serving in the Biden Administration since January 2021, aims to make equity a lasting quality at the U.S. Department of Energy. She was promoted this month to director of the Office of Economic Impact and Diversity at the Energy Department.
“My vision is really to make equity and justice enduring at the Department of Energy,” said Baker, who is on a professional leave of absence from her job at Northeastern. “We do that by baking it into our funding opportunities, baking it into our research and development portfolio, and we do it by building capacity across DOE, educating people, training them, providing tools, because I am not going to be here forever and we need other people to continue this work.”
U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm said Baker has been a “champion” in the Energy Department. “I am so grateful to have Shalanda Baker confirmed to serve as director of DOE’s Office of Economic Impact and Diversity,” said U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm. “There is no more effective champion for building an equitable, just, clean energy economy than Shalanda.”
