About Me
Short Story
Liz grew up in Western North Carolina and attended UNC-Chapel Hill. An environmental leader organizing for a clean energy future since 2001, she has helped start two organizations–the Energy Action Coalition and the Southern Energy Network. In 2008, she joined the board of directors of the Highlander Center. While not working with these organizations, she enjoys biking, hiking, cooking and yoga.
A Longer Story
While at the University of North Carolina, Liz led one of the first successful campus renewable energy campaigns in the southeast and won the Morris K. Udall scholarship, a national environmental leadership scholarship, in both 2002 & 2003. She organized the first Southeast Student Renewable Energy Conference April 2-4, 2004, to engage other Southern schools beyond UNC in energy and climate work and then coordinated regional Southeast youth climate and energy work through the Southern Energy Network through 2009.
She graduated with highest honors in 2004 with a Bachelor’s Degree in Environmental Science and a Minor in Biology. In the summer of 2004 she became a co-founding member of Energy Action Coalition, which she has been actively involved with since then. In late fall 2005, she attended the UN Climate Negotiations in Montreal with Energy Action Coalition and helped start the international youth climate blog: www.itsgettinghotinhere.org. She was co-chair of the Energy Action Coalition Steering Committee, which which oversees the central staff and most of the coalition work, from 2006-2008.
Through her work with the Southern Energy Network, Liz has helped coordinate, attended and presented at numerous conferences, summits and trainings including Mountain Justice Summer trainings, The Dream Reborn, Power Shift 2007, a bunch of state summits, and more. Since the founding of the Energy Action Coalition, Liz has been attending anti-oppression trainings and she is continually in the process of integrating anti-oppressive principles into her life and her work. She has collaborated with a number of community, state, regional and national organizations on fighting new dirty energy facilities and promoting cleaner energy alternatives through local projects and corporate and policy campaigns including direct actions, rallies, lobby days, call-in days, and more.
In 2008, she joined the Board of Directors of the Highlander Research and Education Center, which has been bringing together people and organizations to support social change in the South and Appalachia since 1932. In her free time, Liz enjoys biking, hiking, cooking, yoga and listening to Appalachian music.
