Experts & Staff

Hongpeng Lei serves as Energy Pillar Lead of the Sustainable and Livable Cities Initiative in China. In this capacity, he leads the strategic planning, designing and implementing of energy programs of the Initiative in China.

Hongpeng has more than ten year’s experiences in the field of climate change, energy and sustainable city development. Before joining WRI, he was the leader of WWF China’s Low Carbon City Initiative for more than five years. The Initiative aims to explore low carbon development models in pilot cities and disseminate successful experiences to other cities, and it has played an active role in driving China’s low carbon urban development in the period of 2007- 2012.

He also worked on climate, energy and city development policies in China, and participated in developing China’s Energy and Carbon Emission Scenarios 2050, China’s Annual Solar PV Report, China’s Annual Wind Power Report, The Low Carbon City Index, The Technical Guidelines on Low Carbon Building and Communities, and The True Cost of Coal, etc. He is the key author of the book “Low Carbon Cities: Why and How”, which provides a systematic methodology and criteria for the development of low carbon cities in China.

He has experiences on international climate policies, climate business engagement, and climate public campaigns, and was part of the international climate negotiation under UNFCCC.

Prior to joining WWF, he worked on building energy efficiency in China’s Ministry of Construction for four years, and has extensive experience in implementing building energy efficiency codes and developing green buildings in China. He was a project manager of several international projects funded by GEF, UNDP and the World Bank.

Hongpeng holds a master’s degree in management science and engineering with a focus on energy efficiency and a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering and project management from Tianjin University, China.