Rebecca Pearl-Martinez

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, BOSTON UNIVERSITY INSTITUTE FOR GLOBAL SUSTAINABILITY

2016 Advocacy Award Winner

Rebecca Pearl-Martinez is the Executive Director of the Boston University Institute for Global Sustainability (IGS), where she co-leads IGS research initiatives and works with faculty affiliated with IGS to advance research translation efforts and secure funding for interdisciplinary research projects. Before joining IGS, Pearl-Martinez was an Energy and Climate Policy Consultant at Pearlwood Consulting; a Research Fellow and Head of the Renewable Equity Project at the Center for International Environment and Resource Policy at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy; and a Visiting Lecturer on climate change governance at Tufts University.

Pearl-Martinez has over two decades of experience working to advance the social and equity dimensions of renewable energy and climate change. Since the late 1990s, she has provided technical support to a variety of United Nations (UN) agencies and international organizations, with a particular focus on how energy systems can be responsive to gender concerns. Her career contributions include conducting research on socio-economic trends for Sustainable Energy for All (SE4All); leading a global consultation process and white paper on clean energy for USAID; collecting data for the United Nations Environment Programme’s (UNEP’s) Global Gender and Environment Outlook; developing a curriculum for energy sector professionals with Power Africa; creating a country performance index, nominated for a Katerva Award on sustainability innovations; convening UN agencies and non-government organizations to create the Global Gender and Climate Alliance; and leading the global Women’s Major Group process for the World Summit on Sustainable Development (Rio+10).

Pearl-Martinez holds an MA in Sustainable International Development from the Heller School for Social Policy and Management at Brandeis University, and she is a PhD candidate in the Department of Geography at Durham University.