Melissa Blaustein

Biography

Melissa Blaustein has taken on many pursuits. In her day to day work, she runs the Fuel Freedom Chair for Energy and Social Development at the Fuel Freedom Foundation, where she travels the world working with the top ranked European Business School IESE and its partner universities in Sub-Saharan Africa. There, she oversees capacity building and impact investments in the energy space on projects like off-grid solar panels, fertilizers made from biomass and ethanol as a cooking fuel.
She is also the founder of the global organization Allied for Startups, a worldwide network of advocacy associations focused on improving the policy environment for startups with over forty members in thirty countries around the world.
Her background in sustainability, digital policy and advocacy spans the local, national, and international levels, having held roles at The Obama White House, UN Women, UN Environment, the G20 Research Group, with Fmr. Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and on the team of many San Francisco politicians.
She is deeply involved with her community of Sausalito where she is Vice Chair of the Sustainability Commission, as well as the founding chair of the Commission’s sub-committee on the General Plan Advisory Committee (GPAC). She serves on the Chamber of Commerce Board, is a member of the Rotary Club, a Lead Captain at the Sausalito Art Festival and was appointed to former Mayor Joan Cox’s 2018 Blue Ribbon Committee on Housing where she advocated for new approaches to inclusionary and workforce housing. She was recently appointed to the Rutgers University Big Data Program Advisory Board for San Francisco and to the Art Point San Francisco Advisory Council supporting the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. She is also a member of Nexus Global.
Blaustein has been a featured speaker at the World Trade Organization, the European Commission, The Atlantic Council, The Bay Area Economic Council, South by Southwest, Mobile World Congress, The Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley, and the Jesse Unruh Institute for Politics at USC. She has been published in the Huffington Post, the San Jose Mercury News, Venture Beat, The Hill, and numerous other outlets.
Outside of her work and civic engagement, Blaustein channels her love for protecting our oceans into her efforts as an accomplished, world record holding marathon swimmer. Training at the South End Rowing Club in the San Francisco Bay, in 2017 she became the first woman in 29 years to swim across the strait of Juan de Fuca from Washington to Canada in temperatures as cold as 47 degrees, and in 2018 she successfully crossed the English Channel just two weeks after being pulled from her first attempt two miles short of France. She uses her swims to fundraise for charity and in 2019 will take on the Catalina Channel and Manhattan Island.
Blaustein speaks four languages and holds a Masters Degree Cum Laude in Public Affairs with an emphasis on Global Energy and Sustainability from Sciences Po in Paris and an undergraduate degree with honors in American Studies from UC Berkeley.