Titles

• Distinguished Global Futures Scientist, Julie Ann Wrigley Global Futures Laboratory
• Senior Director, Julie Ann Wrigley Global Futures Laboratory and LightWorks®
• Julie A. Wrigley Chair, Practice of Sustainable Energy Systems, School of Sustainability, College of Global Futures
• Professor of Practice, School of Sustainability, College of Global Futures
• Affiliated Faculty, Center for Biodiversity Outcomes, Global Institute of Sustainability and Innovation

Biography

Gary Dirks is senior director of the Global Futures Laboratory and LightWorks^®, an Arizona State University initiative that capitalizes on ASU's strengths in solar energy and other light-inspired research. He is also the Julie Wrigley Chair of Sustainable Practices and a professor of practice in the School of Sustainability and distinguished sustainability scientist.

Before joining ASU, Dirks was the president of BP Asia-Pacific and the president of BP China. In China, he grew BP from an operation with fewer than 30 employees and no revenue to more than 1,300 employees and revenues of about $4 billion in 2008.

Dirks has served on the boards of the India Council for Sustainable Development, the U.S. China Center for Sustainable Development, and the China Business Council for Sustainable Development, and currently is a member of the Science Advisory Board of Conservation International.

Dirks received China's "Friendship Award" in 2003 and received an honorary CMG (Companion of the Order of St. Michael and St. George) from the United Kingdom in 2005. In December 2008 he was recognized by the People's Daily as one of the 10 most influential multinational company leaders of the last 30 years of China's economic development. In 1999 he received the CLAS Leaders Award for his extraordinary leadership skills while driving positive change locally and internationally by the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Arizona State University.

Dirks received a PhD in chemistry from ASU in 1980. He was the first doctoral student to work in the Center for the Study of Early Events in Photosynthesis (now the Center for Bioenergy and Photosynthesis).

Education

• PhD, Chemistry, Arizona State University, 1980

Expertise

• solar energy systems
• renewable energy
• alternative fuels
• alternative vehicles
• artificial photosynthesis
• bioenergy
• emerging technologies
• energy conservation
• energy economics
• energy efficiency
• energy policy