Newsmakers in the College of Natural Sciences

Denis Hayes Delivers Message of Hope & Warning

Denis Hayes

Denis Hayes, one of the organizers of the original Earth Day in 1970, former director of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and one of Time Magazine's "100 Heroes of the Planet," gave a message of hope and a message of warning to a crowd of hundreds Wednesday night (April 11, 2007) at Laxson Auditorium on the Chico State University campus, reports the Chico Enterprise-Record.

Part of the message was that the world is headed toward catastrophe if serious changes aren't made to slow global warming.

During the presentation, Chico State University President Paul Zingg also gave an honorary doctorate of science to Jack Rawlins, whose endowment to the university has provided scholarships for ecology and conservation, student research and an award for environmental achievement.

Hayes' visit was sponsored by the Rawlins' Professorship of Environmental Literacy. Jack Rawlins endowed the professorship "so that each of us realizes we are part of the environment and part of the problem…and through education, can work as a whole toward a solution," said Biologist James Pushnik, who currently holds the professorship.

"We were very fortunate to get Denis to give this talk, as he is in very high demand," said Pushnik. "He is a visionary and a strong proponent of sustainability. In part, he was willing to make this visit as a tribute to the work our campus is involved in and to recognize the contribution of Jack Rawlins."

Hayes left his graduate studies at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government to coordinate the first Earth Day in 1970, an event often credited with launching the modern environmental movement. Twenty years later he headed the first International Earth Day, with 200 million participants in 141 countries. Denis serves as chairman of Earth Day Network, the group that coordinates Earth Day activities worldwide.

Today, Hayes is president and CEO of the Bullitt Foundation, a $100 million environmental philanthropy group located in Seattle. An environmental lawyer by training, Hayes has published more than 100 articles, books and papers on energy and the environment.

During the Carter Administration, Hayes headed the federal Solar Energy Research Institute (now the National Renewable Energy Laboratory). From 1983 to 1988, he was an adjunct professor of engineering at  Stanford University. He also has served as director of the Illinois State Energy Office, Senior Fellow at the Worldwatch Institute and Visiting Scholar at the Smithsonian Institution. He is a Fellow of the American Solar Energy Society and co-chairs Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels' Green Ribbon Commission on Climate Protection, exploring non-nuclear climate solutions.

Hayes has received numerous awards. He was selected by Look Magazine as one of the most influential Americans of the 20th Century and by the National Audubon  Society as one of 100 Environmental Heroes of the 20th Century.

Hayes is or has been a trustee or director of Stanford University, Greenpeace USA, the World Resources Institute, the Energy Foundation, the Federation of American Scientists, the League of Conservation Voters, the American Solar Energy Society, the Humane Society of the United States, the National Programming Council for Public Television, CERES, and Children Now.