About Marilyn A. Brown

Marilyn Brown is one of the 16 members of the National Commission on Energy Policy and the former director of the Engineering Science and Technology Division at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Brown has a strong record of publication and service in the field of energy policy and technology forecasting. Her research interests encompass the development and deployment of sustainable energy technologies and issues surrounding the commercialization of new technologies and the evaluation of energy programs and policies. Recent projects include an assessment of the $3 billion per year multi-agency research and development portfolio comprising the U.S. Climate Change Technology Program and development of a national climate change technology policy strategy as required by the 2005 Energy Policy Act.

Brown has been an expert witness in hearings before committees of both the U.S. House of Representatives and the U. S. Senate. She serves on the board of directors of the Southeast Energy Efficiency Alliance, the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, and the Alliance to Save Energy; she is on the editorial boards of several journals including the Journal of Technology Transfer; and she is a member of the National Academies’ Board of Energy and Environmental Systems. Her more than 150 publications include “Assessing U.S. Energy Policy,” with Virginia Tech history professor Richard F. Hirsh and his recent Ph.D. student Ben Sovacool, which appeared in Daedalus, the Journal of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2006).

She received her bachelor of arts in political science from Rutgers University (1971), her master’s in resource planning from the University of Massachusetts (1973), and her Ph.D. in geography from The Ohio State University (1977). She is a certified energy manager with the Association of Energy Engineers.