Stanford University will inaugurate its first sustainability and climate crisis school, thanks to a landmark $1.1 billion donation from entrepreneur John Doerr. Out of the $1.69 billion gifts, Mr. Doerr's contribution is the single-largest donation towards the university's fight against climate change.
"Stanford is making a bold, actionable, and enduring commitment to tackling humanity's greatest challenge, and we have a deep conviction in its ambition and abilities," said John and Ann Doerr.
John Doerr is ranked as the 2022's 146th richest man in the world by Forbes Magazine and authors No.1 New York Times bestseller Speed and Scale, a book that lays down a 10-step strategy to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions. According to Doerr, the climate crisis should be the top 2 issue in the U.S. instead of the 9th position. Further, he opines that the 2% philanthropy towards climate is not enough and that it should be around 20-30% because climate challenges are harder to control, and the reward takes longer to come. Doerr expresses that the enthusiasm and rage of young people are what gives him hope for reversing climate catastrophe. That young people learning technology for the right reasons can help accelerate the use of clean energy, rapidly deployable energy compared to fossil fuel alternatives, to overcome not just climate issues but incumbent business and political entrances. The billionaire also hopes that blockchain technology can be used in a way that authenticates carbon coins and carbon reductions.
The Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability will be dedicated to conducting studies and adopting new technologies that will quicken the progression to a decarbonized economy on a global scale. The school will debut this fall, and the doors of academic departments will open under the leadership of around 90 current Stanford faculty members. And over the next decade, merge current Stanford departments and institutes, launch an initiative to fund fresh projects, and hire 60 new specialists in the fields of energy, climate science, sustainable development, and environmental justice,
"These gifts will help Stanford bring its full effort to bear on solving the most complex problems in climate and sustainability, and on training the next generation of students who are eager and driven to address these challenges," said Marc Tessier-Lavigne, Stanford President.
Stanford professor of mechanical engineering and materials science, Dr. Arun Majumdar, has been designated as the dean of the new school.
The other contributors to the Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability include luminaries of the technology industry like millionaire Jerry Yan and his wife, Akiko Yamazaki, and Susan Orr, Pro Vice-Chancellor Education at De Montfort University and her husband, Lynn Orr, Emeritus, Energy Resources Engineering Professor and a former Under Secretary for Science and Energy of the U.S. Department of Energy (among others).
