Peggy Liu

Peggy Liu, Chairperson of Joint US-China Collaboration on Clean Energy, is a leading environmentalist and cross-cultural strategist specialising in sustainable innovation and international cooperation on climate solutions. Named "China's Green Goddess" and recognised as a TIME Hero of the Environment, she has catalysed transformational change across China in sustainable cities, clean energy, and food systems since 2007, earning recognition from The Economist as "one of the most innovative thinkers in Asia". Through her keynotes and consultancy, Peggy equips organisations and governments with practical strategies to scale sustainability initiatives, navigate cross-cultural collaboration, and accelerate societal-scale change through her distinctive "Tornado Leadership" methodology.

When pollution, drought, and urban sprawl threatened to overwhelm China's environmental future, Peggy Liu stepped forward to lead systemic transformation across the nation's most pressing sustainability challenges. Since 2007, the Chairperson of Joint US-China Collaboration on Clean Energy has catalysed nationwide change in sustainable cities, energy-efficient infrastructure, and food systems, earning recognition from Chinese media as the "Green Goddess of China" and from TIME as a Hero of the Environment. Her work has fundamentally reshaped how the world's most populous nation approaches environmental protection, embedding sustainability into China's national identity whilst pioneering cross-cultural collaboration models that governments and corporations worldwide now seek to replicate.

Peggy's credentials span technical rigour, entrepreneurial vision, and policy influence. An MIT-trained electrical engineer who began her career at McKinsey, she later founded one of Silicon Valley's earliest ecommerce ventures, earning a Red Herring cover story that dubbed her an "Internet Pioneer". This foundation in technology and venture capital uniquely positioned her to introduce Smart Grid infrastructure to China, revolutionise electricity distribution, and lead the nation's transition from incandescent to energy-efficient lighting. The Economist named her "one of the most innovative thinkers in Asia", whilst the World Economic Forum recognised her as a Young Global Leader. She has educated over 1,000 Chinese government leaders on sustainable city development through her roles as Distinguished Professor at China Academy of Governance and lecturer at the China Executive Leadership Academy of Pudong and National Academy for Mayors of China. Her current programmatic focus, Food Heroes, employs play-based education to transform children's food choices towards plant-based, low-impact diets, addressing what she identifies as the singular acupressure point that achieves all 17 Global Goals.

Through her keynotes and consultancy, Peggy equips audiences with her distinctive "Tornado Leadership" methodology, a framework developed across policy, economic, technical, and spiritual realms to drive societal-scale transformation. She translates complex lessons from tackling China's toughest environmental battles into practical strategies that organisations can implement immediately, whether navigating international partnerships, scaling sustainable innovation, or accelerating cultural change. Audiences leave her sessions with concrete tools for cross-cultural collaboration and a renewed understanding that the most critical skill for the next generation is heart-based storytelling. Peggy's conviction that cultural translators will shape our collective future informs every engagement, empowering leaders to unite diverse stakeholders and deliver measurable impact on both personal and planetary health.