Carl Leighty

Carl Leighty is the Vice President of the environment practice at Waxman Strategies, where he works with clients on a broad range of climate and clean energy issues at the U.S. federal level. Carl has policy expertise in clean energy production including solar, wind, advanced nuclear, and advanced geothermal, direct air capture, biofuels and other low- and zero-carbon fuels, sustainable aviation fuels, electric vehicles, industrial decarbonization, carbon capture, utilization, and sequestration, building electrification, and sustainable agricultural practices. He also works closely on designing economy- and sector-wide policies including clean energy standards, low-carbon fuel standards, and carbon pricing schemes. He has supported clients in the environmental community, academia, and industry.

Carl works with clients to provide legislative and regulatory research, political analysis, stakeholder mapping, coalition building, and advocacy. He regularly engages with policymakers in Congress and at the agencies, providing educational materials and briefings, developing policies, crafting advocacy letters, writing testimony, submitting appropriations requests, and all other elements of effective advocacy campaigns.

Before joining Waxman Strategies, Carl worked at AJW Inc., a government affairs firm located in Washington, DC where he worked on a similar portfolio of clean energy and environment issues. He was a lead author on an October 2019 report entitled “Innovation and Markets in Carbon Emissions Management”.  He holds a B.A. in Economics from the University of Virginia.