Griffin Thompson, PhD
Griffin Thompson, PhD - Adjunct Professor, Loyola University Chicago and Former Director of the Office of Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency, U.S. State Department
Dr. Griffin Thompson recently retired as the U.S. State Department’s Director of the Office of Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency, in the Bureau of Energy Resources. In that position, he was responsible for guiding the Department’s work on the global energy transformation, leveraging U.S. leadership in renewable energy innovation to accelerate the global adoption of renewable energy technologies in line with U.S. foreign policy. Before joining the Bureau of Energy Resources, Dr. Thompson was the Senior Climate Change Program Manager in the State Department’s Bureau of Oceans, Environment and Science, and served as the U.S. Government Lead negotiator on Technology within the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
Before coming to the State Department, Dr. Thompson served as Director of the Office of Energy at the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID); Executive Director of the International Institute for Energy Conservation (IIEC); and Senior Policy Analyst at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL).
Dr. Thompson has a Ph.D. in Political Philosophy from Georgetown University and a B.A. in English from Gonzaga University. From 2103 to 2021, he taught a range of classes on ethics, energy, and climate change at Georgetown University and the U. of Maryland. Griff is currently teaching classes at LUC on climate change, American Foreign Policy, the Politics of Energy, and the Politics of Technology.
Griffin Thompson, PhD - Adjunct Professor, Loyola University Chicago and Former Director of the Office of Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency, U.S. State Department
Dr. Griffin Thompson recently retired as the U.S. State Department’s Director of the Office of Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency, in the Bureau of Energy Resources. In that position, he was responsible for guiding the Department’s work on the global energy transformation, leveraging U.S. leadership in renewable energy innovation to accelerate the global adoption of renewable energy technologies in line with U.S. foreign policy. Before joining the Bureau of Energy Resources, Dr. Thompson was the Senior Climate Change Program Manager in the State Department’s Bureau of Oceans, Environment and Science, and served as the U.S. Government Lead negotiator on Technology within the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
Before coming to the State Department, Dr. Thompson served as Director of the Office of Energy at the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID); Executive Director of the International Institute for Energy Conservation (IIEC); and Senior Policy Analyst at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL).
Dr. Thompson has a Ph.D. in Political Philosophy from Georgetown University and a B.A. in English from Gonzaga University. From 2103 to 2021, he taught a range of classes on ethics, energy, and climate change at Georgetown University and the U. of Maryland. Griff is currently teaching classes at LUC on climate change, American Foreign Policy, the Politics of Energy, and the Politics of Technology.