Aimee Christensen

Founder & Chief Executive Officer

Aimée is the founder and CEO of Christensen Global Strategies, advising clients seeking to address the global challenges of climate change, ecosystem degradation, and resource scarcity, and their impacts on conflict and development. Her clients are wide-ranging, from governments, to non-profits, to corporations, to investors, to emerging technology companies. They have included the Clinton Global Initiative, Duke Energy, the Elders, the Global Observatory, Ogilvy, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Swiss Re, the United Nations Development Program, the U.S. Department of Energy, Virgin Unite, and Wolfensohn + Co. She has advised them on corporate and philanthropic strategy, policy and legislative issues, specific transactions, and she has drafted congressional testimony and advised on green economic development programs. ... Read More

Aimée serves as a Member of the Homeland Security Advisory Council’s Task Force on Sustainability and Efficiency, advising Secretary Janet Napolitano. She was a National Co-Chair of Cleantech & Green Business for Obama, and in early 2009 she co-founded the Clean Economy Network, whose collaboration with other business groups, the We Can Lead campaign, brought over 250 business leaders to Capitol Hill in February 2010 and October 2009, to advocate for passage of comprehensive climate change and energy legislation. She is also a member of the Advisory Boards of EKO Asset Management Partners, the Sustainable Endowments Institute, Vote Solar, and the Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy. She is a member of the Board of the American Council on Renewable Energy, ecoAmerica, the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development, and the National Association of Environmental Law Societies. She also served as a member of the Council on Foreign Relations Task Force on Climate Change, and is a founder of and pro bono adviser to the Newark Green Future Network and Summit, supporting Newark, NJ Mayor Cory A. Booker.

Trained as an environmental and energy lawyer with deep experience in energy policy in Washington, she brings additional knowledge and perspective from her time developing climate change and sustainability strategy in the corporate, investment, and philanthropic sectors. From 2006 to 2007, Aimée worked with Google.org, the philanthropic arm of Google, where she developed strategy, guided early initiatives, and helped build the team working on global warming and its broader relationship to poverty, development, and public health. She developed and incubated the “RechargeIT” plug-in hybrid vehicle-to-grid project, and she advised Google's Greenteam to develop its corporate climate strategy including a commitment to carbon neutrality and adoption of a “shadow price” for carbon.

In 2005, she worked with the Legal Department of the World Bank advising the Bank’s carbon finance business. In 2003 and 2004, she was Executive Director of Environment2004, informing the American public about the impact of federal environmental policy on health, the economy, and quality of life. Immediately prior, she practiced law with Baker & McKenzie, advising clients on energy and environmental transactions and compliance as well as legislative strategies. She also worked on trade and environmental issues for the International Centre for Trade & Sustainable Development in Geneva, opening understanding between governments and activists at a time of increasing challenge to the global trading framework and globalization itself. From 1994 to 1998, Aimée developed and executed Latin American energy policy at the U.S. Department of Energy, including negotiating the Summit of the Americas energy agenda and the first bilateral and regional agreements on climate change, and serving as energy advisor for Presidential engagement with Latin America.

Aimée has been awarded a 2010 Aspen Institute Catto Fellowship for her environmental leadership. In 2008, she was named an “Emerging Leader” by the New Leaders Council, and she spoke on energy issues at the 2008 Democratic National Convention. She has appeared on Washington News Channel 8, NPR, Fox News, McLaughlin: One on One, Salon.com, USAToday, and Grist Magazine. At the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Aimée was elected to represent “U.S. Youth at Rio”, introducing then Senator Al Gore before the Global Forum, and calling for greater U.S. leadership toward a shared vision of a healthier, safer, more equitable future. She received her B.A. from Smith College and her J.D. from Stanford Law School, where she wrote and led efforts to obtain the adoption by Stanford’s Board of Trustees of the “Climate Change and Investment Responsibility Policy” that governs Stanford’s investments to this day.

Tricia Dunlap

Director & Chief Financial Officer

Tricia provides strategic support, research, and planning for CGS clients. She has focused on the impact of green school design and curricula on student performance; energy policy; energy access in the developing world; and corporate sustainability initiatives. A polished and engaging public speaker, Tricia has also served as moderator or panelist on a variety of forums, including "Vision 2020: A View of Our Energy Future" at the University of Richmond, and the U.S. Department of Transportation's Office of Small Business Utilization's conference "From Recovery to Beyond: Small Businesses Thinking Big." In May, 2011 Tricia earned her juris doctor cum laude from the University of Richmond, School of Law where she served as Articles Editor for Volume 45 of the Law Review and was the Robert R. Merhige, Jr. Fellow with the Merhige Center for Environmental Studies. ... Read More

As the Merhige Fellow, Tricia assisted Noah Sachs, Director of the Merhige Center for Environmental Studies, in educational outreach and program development. Tricia served as research assistant for former Virginia Governor and Distinguished Lecturer, Tim Kaine, helping build curriculum for his class "The Future of Equality" and collect research for his article "Economic Policy After the Lost Decade: From Over-Consumption to Innovation" published in the University of Richmond Law Review, May 2011. In early 2010 at the William B. Spong Moot Court Tournament at William & Mary Law School, she won Runner-Up Best Oralist and with her teammate won Runner-Up Best Overall Team, and Best Brief. During the summer of 2009 she interned for United States Magistrate Judge M. Hannah Lauck, Eastern District of Virginia, and for Daniel Slone in the Sustainability/ Climate Change group at McGuireWoods.

Prior to law school, Tricia taught Advanced Placement U.S. Government, Advanced Placement Psychology, and U.S. history to high school juniors and seniors. From 1995 to 2003, she also served as financial counsel and bookkeeper for a small, family-held consulting firm. Tricia holds a Bachelor of Arts cum laude in political science from Loyola University of Chicago. As a James Madison Fellow, she earned a Master of Arts in American history from the University of Maryland, and in 2006 joined the elite ranks of teachers in the U.S. by earning National Board Certification, a credential held by fewer than 100,000 out of 7 million U.S. teachers.

Monica Walsh

Director & Chief Operating Officer

Monica brings nearly twenty years of experience in government, politics, and non-profits to work with CGS clients. By providing investment, philanthropic, fundraising, and non-profit strategy guidance, Monica helps CGS clients realize genuine impact from their financial resources. Monica generates ideas, creates possibilities, and designs solutions that benefit project missions. A highly skilled director and project manager, Monica pairs the right people and projects to maximize efficiency. Her knack for marshaling resources gets the job done with enthusiasm and attention to detail.... Read More

Monica and Aimee worked together in the Natural Resources division of the 1992 Clinton/Gore Transition Team, and later in the Department of Energy. Monica went on to build a career in the education, social reform, and well-being non-profit sectors, working directly with boards of directors and executive directors building strategy, efficiency, and finding funding partners. Most recently, she assisted Professor Lawrence Lessig’s political reform organization, Change Congress. While working in election reform, she helped create greater resource efficiency by bringing together and organizing three major funders to establish a new foundation, the Democracy Fund. In working with Democracy Fund, Monica raised start up capital, built funding alliances and created a process to hire a CEO to manage and grow the foundation.

Monica holds a B.A. in political science and communications from St. Mary’s University, in San Antonio, TX. She is trained in Lynne Twist's “Fundraising from the Heart” method, and believes that the job of a fundraiser is to offer people the opportunity to express their generosity which in turn contributes to the greater generosity needed in our world.