Leah Clayton

Leah Clayton, from Evergreen, Colorado, is pursuing a PhD in earth system science at Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability. She graduated from Yale University with a bachelor’s degree in earth and planetary sciences and certificates in climate science and solutions and energy studies. Leah aspires to help mitigate anthropogenic climate change by first understanding earth-system resilience to disturbances and then identifying context-specific, responsible, and durable solutions that focus on hydroclimate and wildfire. As part of the NASA Arctic-Boreal Vulnerability Experiment, Leah researched how climate change is altering permafrost ecosystems and intensifying wildfires, which in turn increase greenhouse gas emissions. Motivated to address these outsized impacts in the Arctic, she switched her focus to bring earth-science approaches to emerging climate solutions at the Carbon Containment Lab, an interdisciplinary nonprofit. Leah led projects across the western United States that combined wildfire mitigation with biomass carbon removal and storage.