In 1979, an obscure EPA report on coal liquefaction sparked a realization that would alter the course of environmental history and define the life of Rafe Pomerance. Mr. Pomerance, a pioneering environmentalist and key architect of international climate policy who first sounded the alarm on global warming to the U.S. government, died on May 21, 2026, at the age of 79. His life was defined by a singular, relentless mission to force the world's most powerful institutions to acknowledge the invisible chemistry of the atmosphere. This journey into the heart of the climate crisis began not with a grand manifesto, but with a 66-page technical document. While working as a lobbyist, he stumbled upon an obscure Environmental Protection Agency report that warned of the greenhouse effect, a discovery that transformed him into what author Nathaniel Rich described as a hyperkinetic lobbyist who, at great personal cost, tried to warn humanity of what was coming. This energy was necessary to combat the slow-moving gears of international diplomacy that often lagged decades behind the scientific consensus, as detailed in an account by The New York Times Magazine.

Pomerance realized in 1979 that the world was on a collision course with its own atmosphere. He did not merely observe this threat; he acted with an urgent intellectualism that bridged the gap between complex geophysics and the political machinery of Washington. He arranged a pivotal meeting that year with geophysicist Gordon MacDonald to brief the Carter administration on the risks of carbon dioxide emissions. His education at Cornell University, where he earned a B.A. in History in 1968, and his early service as a VISTA volunteer in Virginia provided the foundational skills in community organizing that he would later apply to the global stage. By 1972, he had moved into the environmental sphere, working for the Urban Environment Conference under Senator Phil Hart, a role that began his long tenure as a Washington insider capable of navigating complex legislative environments. He launched the National Clean Air Coalition in 1973, serving as its coordinator for five years and establishing the reputation for applied advocacy that would define his career. (Cornell Chronicle)

During his tenure as President of Friends of the Earth from 1980 to 1984, Pomerance became a fixture in congressional hearing rooms. His 1984 testimony served as a stark warning to lawmakers that the consequences of climate change would be irreversible once they became fully apparent to the general public. He famously asked, "What right does this generation have to warm up the Earth?" This question underpinned his work at the World Resources Institute, where he served as a Senior Associate for climate change and ozone depletion from 1986 to 1993. During this period, he saw the potential for international cooperation through the successful negotiations of the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer, a victory that stood in contrast to the more difficult battles ahead. Pomerance was a man of applied advocacy; former U.S. Senator Tim Wirth noted that his approach was not just about telling people what they ought to do, but designing the specific mechanisms to get it done. This was evident in 1989 when, during a conference in Toronto, Pomerance proposed the internationally recognized target of a 20 percent reduction in carbon emissions by the year 2000. (U.S. Department of State Archive)

His ability to navigate the halls of power led to his appointment as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Environment and Development under President Bill Clinton in 1993. In this role, he served as a lead U.S. negotiator for the Kyoto Protocol, the first major international treaty to set binding emission reduction targets. Even after leaving the State Department in 1999 to found the Climate Policy Center, Pomerance remained at the vanguard of the crisis. He understood that every molecule of carbon dioxide has a global impact, living long in the atmosphere while trapping radiation and reflecting it back to the Earth. His work was never purely theoretical; he led the successful effort to establish the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy, or ARPA-E, which was signed into law in 2007 to spur technological innovation. He viewed climate change as a generational issue and a golden opportunity to pursue solutions and new technology, as he noted in an interview with The DC Line.

In his later years, Pomerance’s focus narrowed to the most fragile part of the global system. He launched Arctic 21 in 2014 to highlight the unraveling of the polar regions, serving as a Distinguished Senior Arctic Policy Fellow at the Woodwell Climate Research Center. He understood that the melting of the north was the ultimate signal of the irreversible consequences he had warned of decades earlier. He remained active in this pursuit, serving on the Polar Research Board of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences from 2015 to 2019, always insisting that the fate of Greenland is the fate of Miami. Pomerance lived in the same house in the Kalorama Triangle neighborhood of Washington, D.C., for over 50 years, a stable base for a career spent in constant motion. Though he witnessed the slow pace of international diplomacy, he noted that the world had moved from no awareness to total awareness during his lifetime. He remained a dauntless warrior for the planet until his death in Washington, D.C.

Rafe Pomerance will be remembered as the man who turned a technical report into a global movement. He possessed the rare ability to see the catastrophic potential in a single molecule of carbon dioxide and the political acumen to bring that vision to the highest levels of government. By bridging the gap between the laboratory and the legislative chamber, he ensured that the world could never claim ignorance of the climate crisis. His life’s work stands as a testament to the power of persistent, applied advocacy in the face of an existential threat, leaving behind a legacy of awareness that he helped build from the ground up. He is survived by his wife, Lenore Markwett Pomerance, and their three children, Benjamin Cooley, Lilah, and Ethan.