Christa Hasenkopf

Chief Executive Officer and Co‐Founder OpenAQ, Washington, District of Colombia United States

Biography

Christa Hasenkopf is an atmospheric scientist, passionate about fighting air inequality ‐ the unequal access to clean air to breathe across the world ‐ and using open data and convening community to do it. She is the chief executive officer and co‐founder of OpenAQ, a non‐profit housing a real‐time global open air quality data platform and community, created and used by scientists, software developers, journalists, and lovers of open environmental data. She is also an adjunct associate professor at Georgetown University and an adjunct professor at Johns Hopkins in the Environmental Science & Policy Program, part of the Advanced Academic Program. Previously, Hasenkopf was the first Chief Air Pollution Advisor to the Medical Director at the U.S. Department of State. Prior to this work, she was a fellow in the Global Development Lab at USAID. Before moving to Washington, D.C., Hasenkopf conducted postdoctoral research on air pollution in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. With colleagues, she launched the first air quality instrument in Mongolia that shared air quality data via social media. Hasenkopf received a PhD in atmospheric & oceanic sciences from the University of Colorado and a BSc in astronomy & astrophysics from Penn State University. She is a former Echoing Green Fellow, USAID/PEER Partner, NSF International Research Fellow, Fulbright Fellow, and corps member in Teach for America.