Stephanie Cairns has three decades of experience working with leading climate change and environmental non-governmental organizations, policy institutes, and expert panels. She is currently Senior Director at the Pacific Institute for Climate Solutions. She was a founding staff member with the Smart Prosperity Institute, where she directed programs on carbon pricing, sustainable communities, and circular economy. Earlier in her career, she founded the Pembina Institute's Ecological Fiscal Reform program, worked as a researcher on Parliament Hill, and was a strategic advisor in the Prime Minister's Policy and Research Office. She is currently a Coordinating Lead Author for the North American Biodiversity and Climate Change Assessment.
Cairns has advised leaders at every order of Canadian jurisdiction. She has been named the University of Guelph’s visiting Kinross Chair in Environmental Governance, and to the Council of Canadian Academies’ Expert Panel on Circular Economy, Alberta’s Climate Change Advisory Panel, and Canadian Heritage’s Panel on Ecological Integrity of National Parks. She was the first woman appointed as national president of the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society.
Cairns holds a MSc in Corporate Environmental Management from the International Institute for Industrial Environmental Economics at Lund University, Sweden, and a BA in Environmental Studies, Political Science, and Economics from the University of Toronto.
