Virgil Welch is a Partner at Caliber Strategies, a leading California consulting firm that works with clean technology and policy innovators to achieve successful regulatory, administrative and market outcomes. He also serves as Director of the California Carbon Solutions Coalition, a business & labor coalition working to ensure that carbon capture, removal, utilization and sequestration technologies play a key role in California’s approach to climate action.
Mr. Welch has worked at the forefront of California’s climate, air quality and clean energy programs for more than two decades, serving as a Governor’s appointee under three administrations as Special Counsel and Chief Advisor to the California Air Resources Board Chair. In his role at CARB, he helped to lead the creation of multiple globally recognized programs to cut pollution and greenhouse emissions though deployment of clean technologies, including multiple sets of standards for cleaner light, medium and heavy-duty vehicles; an economy-wide cap-and-trade program; a Low Carbon Fuel Standard; a comprehensive set of programs to slash short-lived climate pollutants. Prior to his service at the California Air Resources Board, Mr. Welch helped lead the Environmental Defense Fund’s successful sponsorship of Assembly Bill 32, the California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006.