SHERRI GOODMAN

Secretary General of the International military council on climate & security; Senior Fellow at the wilson center’s polar institute and environmental change & security program; Senior Strategist at the center for climate and security. Previously, President and CEO of the Consortium for Ocean Leadership.

Sherri Goodman is an experienced leader and senior executive, lawyer, and board director in the fields of national security, climate change, energy, science, oceans, and environment. Sherri works to advance climate and environmental security into broader security strategy and policy with governments, businesses, non-profits and academic institutions.

Sherri served as Senior Vice President and General Counsel of CNA (Center for Naval Analyses)  where she was also the founder and Executive Director of the CNA Military Advisory Board, whose landmark reports include National Security and the Threat of Climate Change (2007), and National Security and the Accelerating Risks of Climate Change (2014),  Advanced Energy and US National Security (2017), and The Role of Water Stress in Instability and Conflict (2017) among others.  The film The Age of Consequences  in which Goodman is featured, is based on the work of the CNA Military Advisory Board.

Sherri served as the first Deputy Undersecretary of Defense (Environmental Security) from 1993-2001. As the chief environmental, safety, and occupational health officer for the Department of Defense (DoD), she oversaw an annual budget of over $5 billion. She established the first environmental, safety and health performance metrics for the Department and, as the nation’s largest energy user, led its energy, environmental and natural resource conservation programs. Overseeing the President’s plan for revitalizing base closure communities, she ensured that 80% of base closure property became available for transfer and reuse. Ms. Goodman has twice received the DoD medal for Distinguished Public Service, the Gold Medal from the National Defense Industrial Association, and the EPA’s Climate Change Award

Sherri serves on the boards of the Atlantic Council, the Council on Strategic Risks, the Joint Ocean Commission Leadership Council, the Marshall Legacy Institute, the National Academies Advisory Committee of the US Global Change Research Program, Sandia National Labs’ Energy & Homeland Security External Advisory Board,   the Secretary of State’s International Security Advisory Board,  and the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR).  She is a life member of the Council on Foreign Relations, served on its Arctic Task Force in 2016 and chaired the Advisory Committee on Governing Solar Geo-Engineering in 2022.

A summa cum laude graduate of Amherst College, she has degrees from Harvard Law School and Harvard Kennedy School. She received an Honorary Doctorate in Humane Letters from Amherst College in 2018.