Sonia Aggarwal is an engineer and policy advisor, who served as the Special Assistant to President Biden for Climate Policy, Innovation, and Deployment. Starting as a senior advisor when the President was inaugurated and serving through the end of 2022,[1] her appointment was understood by the media to be a signal of the Biden administration's seriousness in pursuing ambitious clean energy policy.[2] She is credited with helping to set the U.S. greenhouse gas emissions target of 50-52% reductions by 2030,[3] as well as contributing heavily to the design of Build Back Better, which passed Congress as the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and the Inflation Reduction Act.[4] She also co-chaired the Climate Innovation Working Group,[5] alongside the Office of Management and Budget and the Office of Science and Technology Policy.
Aggarwal was born in South Carolina and grew up in Ohio,[6] attending Laurel School and graduating from Hawken School in 2002.[7] Aggarwal completed a Bachelor of Science degree in astronomy and physics from Haverford College and a masters from Stanford University's engineering school.[8]
Aggarwal is the daughter of Raj Aggarwal, the former dean of the University of Akron College of Business Administration.[9]
Aggarwal worked briefly in the accident prevention design engineering group at Perry Nuclear Power Plant,[10] conducted research on how renewable energy could serve remote areas in India without comprehensive access to electricity, advised cleantech startup companies on communications, managed research for ClimateWorks Foundation,[11] and co-founded the non-partisan think tank Energy Innovation,[12] where she returned as CEO after serving in the White House.