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Stephanie Epner, Richard Kidd, and Alan Leung Join the Center for Climate and Security Advisory Board

By Brigitte Hugh

The Center for Climate and Security is pleased and honored to announce that Stephanie Epner, Richard Kidd, and Alan Leung have joined its distinguished Advisory Board of military and national security leaders. This group supports CCS by providing substantive and strategic guidance. 

Stephanie Epner is the Senior Director for Global Initiatives at the Climate Imperative Foundation. Most recently, Ms. Epner served on the White House National Security Council (NSC) staff, where she led the directorate responsible for coordinating the Biden Administration’s international climate and energy policy. Prior to that, she served as senior advisor to Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry and as the climate and energy lead on the Secretary of State’s Policy Planning Staff. Read Ms. Epner’s full bio here.

Richard G. Kidd IV retired in 2023 after over 31 years of combined Federal service, including Senior Executive Service assignments in three federal agencies and the White House. Mr. Kidd most recently served as the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Environment and Energy Security. In this role, he provided strategic direction and programmatic oversight to the Department’s environmental stewardship and energy resilience efforts. Mr. Kidd has also been an international civil servant with over five years of work with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and the World Food Programme. Read Mr. Kidd’s full bio here

Alan Leung is Senior Vice President for Threat Intelligence, Global Security at Macquarie Group, a global financial services group providing clients with asset management, retail and business banking, wealth management, leasing and asset financing, market access, commodity trading, renewables development, specialist advice, access to capital, and principal investment. He has over 15 years of industry experience in enterprise risk management, corporate security, emergency, and crisis response. Alan also authors a personal newsletter, Securing our Climate, which highlights stories at the intersection of climate change, security, politics, and finance. Read Mr. Leung’s full bio here.

Lyston Lea Joins the Center for Climate and Security Advisory Board

By Brigitte Hugh

The Center for Climate and Security is pleased and honored to announce that Lyston Lea has joined its distinguished Advisory Board of military and national security leaders. This group supports CCS leadership by providing substantive and strategic guidance. 

Mr. Lea recently retired from Defense Intelligence Senior Level Federal service in March 2022, after over 38 years of professional experience working in the Intelligence Community (IC). Before retiring he served as the Principal Advisor to the Director of the National Maritime Intelligence-Integration Office (NMIO). During his career, Mr. Lea served in the Analytic Integrity and Standards Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), the Defense Intelligence Agency, as a Senior Briefer for the J2’s daily Intelligence Briefing to the Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Deputy Office Chief of the Defense Warning Office. Mr. Lea holds a Master of Science in National Security Studies from the National War College, a Master of Arts in Public Administration from Fordham University, and a Bachelor of Arts in History from Washington & Jefferson College. 

Read Mr. Lea’s full bio here.

Dan Chiu, Ellen Laipson, Maureen Sullivan, and Amali Tower Join the Center for Climate and Security Advisory Board

By Brigitte Hugh

The Center for Climate and Security is pleased and honored to announce that Dr. Daniel Y. Chiu, Ellen Laipson, Maureen Sullivan and Amali Tower have joined its distinguished Advisory Board of military and national security leaders. This group supports CCS leadership by providing substantive and strategic guidance as needed. 

Dr. Daniel Y. Chiu is the Director of the Joint Advanced Warfighting Division at the Institute for Defense Analyses, a Federally Funded Research and Development Center. He leads a diverse team of military, technical, and analytic experts to support the US Department of Defense in concept and capability development through Joint Experimentation and Defense Innovation. Working primarily with the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the Joint Staff, his team focuses on analytic wargaming, dynamic red-teaming, and broad-spectrum horizon scanning as well as technical and historic lessons-learned. Read Dr. Chiu’s full bio here

Ellen Laipson is the Director of the International Security program and directs the Center for Security Policy Studies at the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University. She joined GMU in 2017 after a distinguished 25 year career in government and as President and CEO of the Stimson Center (2002-2015). Her last post in government was Vice Chair of the National Intelligence Council (1997-2002). She also served on the State Department’s policy planning staff, the National Security Council staff, and worked at the Congressional Research Service for more than a decade. Read Ms. Laipson’s full bio here

Maureen Sullivan is the former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense (Environment). For 29 years, Ms. Sullivan served in various leadership positions as a member of the Office of the Secretary of Defense environmental staff. During her service, she was responsible for DoD’s policies and programs related to compliance with environmental laws; management of natural and cultural resources; cleanup of contaminated sites; fire and emergency services; green/sustainable buildings; installation emergency management; international environmental policy; and planning to address emerging chemicals of concern. Ms. Sullivan retired in 2020 after over 40 years of service in the Department of Defense. Read Ms. Sullivan’s full bio here

Amali Tower is the founder and executive director of Climate Refugees. She has extensive global experience in refugee protection, refugee resettlement, and in forced migration and displacement contexts, having worked for numerous NGOs, the UN Refugee Agency, and the US Refugee Admissions Program. She has conducted country and regional visits of case studies and research in climate-induced displacement contexts, including in urban and camp settings. Read Ms. Tower’s full bio here.

Robert Taylor Joins the Center for Climate and Security Advisory Board

Taylor, Robert

The Center for Climate and Security is pleased and honored to announce that Robert S. Taylor has joined its distinguished Advisory Board of military and national security leaders. Bob is currently the General Counsel of MCE Social Capital, an entity dedicated to providing financing and support to microfinance and other organizations in roughly 40 countries throughout the developing world.  In this position, Bob is addressing the challenge of lifting people and regions out of poverty in a sustainable fashion. In addition, Bob is a veteran of the Department of Defense (DoD), where he served as Principal Deputy General Counsel (PDGC) of DoD from 2009 to 2017. He spent nearly two of those years as Acting General Counsel.  He also served as the first Deputy General Counsel (Environment and Installations) in DoD, from 1995 to 2002. (more…)

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