Today we’d like to introduce you to Cory Combs.
Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
It’s been a winding road! Today, my days are spent advising governments and multinational corporations on the global climate and industrial transitions, my nights on the research to make certain it’s good advice. It’s a far cry from food stamps and the factory I started in growing up, and – as frustrating as climate work can be, given the political crosswinds – it’s the privilege of a lifetime to do the work I do now. Time for reflection is scarce given all that’s going on right now, but it’s worth taking a little. Thank you for the time here; it’s bringing back memories.
One that comes to mind: One Sunday afternoon a decade ago I sat in a quiet Japanese pub in downtown Beijing, listening to the owner opine on which country – his by birth or his by livelihood – represented the world’s future. I had just finished working a public seminar on environmental issues (a joint China-US venture, one of many I supported during that earlier period of bilateral optimism).
He had opened that afternoon for no other reason, as far as I could tell, than to let in strays. This was a time of significant China-Japan tensions, so I was delicate when I asked why he’d left Japan. I remember him making an exaggerated wave across his bar before asking me, where did I leave, and why? Did I want to open my own place here in China, something British or American? He could tell it was one of them, but not which, either in Mandarin or in English (I spoke no Japanese). The fact that I had no particular answers for him, besides “no,” brought home the fact that at that point I still had no idea what I was doing. I knew motivation and frustration, but hardly what to do with them. I just knew I liked talking to people who lived in multiple worlds, so to speak, and who thought way too much about the world and what it might be like in the future.
Background: I’d jumped from 17 years of economic and familial insecurity to, somehow, a full ride at Yale, where people I innately feared – because I hadn’t yet distinguished respect from fear of falling short in others’ eyes – told me I now had a future. I studied astrophysics and philosophy of science. Why? Partly because they were inspiring, and partly (in hindsight) because whatever got me through earlier years left me feeling safer when I was struggling than when I wasn’t. Luckily, I also fell in love with the type of challenges they offered: messy data, complex systems, that bright light when you discover the end of the metaphorical string to pull on.
University funding took me to South America for astrophysics. After graduation, an affiliated fellowship took me to China. I wanted to do something “technical,” whatever that meant, and something that dealt with making sense of complex systems, whatever that meant. But as much as I loved the laboratory, I wanted to do something more…societally focused. After several years of wandering and wondering, somehow a simple, random conversation over katsu – with someone else who’d found themselves a place far from what they’d envisioned, but built their own thing they loved – helped clarify things for me. First of all, that I was still floating around when I could be laying seeds.
What did I know? That the world was changing; that what mattered most was (and is!) people, regardless of place; and that certain combinations of misfortune and privilege create opportunities you cannot forgo. I found people I respected – no longer feared (as much, anyway) – and asked how I could be helpful. Of course, for every ten people I got twenty answers. But between them, I eventually positioned myself as someone who might serve a bridging role in climate work, translating between the technical and policy realms, and specifically between the US and Chinese industry and policy apparatuses.
By 2016 I was applying to graduate school for China studies and international energy economics. Shockingly, there are a few programs for such specific interests, and I was fortunate to get funding for the one I sought, Johns Hopkins SAIS, in downtown Washington, DC. By 2019 I was consulting on energy projects for international project developers and then working on the US Department of Energy’s renewable energy investment team. By 2021 I was working full-time on US-China climate and energy issues at a private outfit where I now lead an international research team. I later moved to LA, with California being the hub of US climate progress.
I’m still back and forth between DC, China, and elsewhere, but LA is home now. I have no regrets.
On April 24, I am returning to DC to testify before Congress, presenting my work on Chinese-led clean energy supply chains and arguing why the US must reinstate – and accelerate – its own cleantech investments for sake of long-term energy and national security. Incidentally, both are advanced by climate security. US politics is a complex system, and progress is slow, but it’s a privilege beyond any prior hope to have chances like this to advance the cases for climate progress.
Here in LA, I’m focused on building new bridges from these foundations – across industry, academia, and government – to contribute to further progress in any way I can. California is key to the country’s success, and the country’s success is key to the world’s.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
“Home” has never been a comfortable concept. I am an LA transplant. Before I hit 30, I was a New York transplant; before that, grad school in Washington, DC; before that, years of life and work in Beijing, Hong Kong, and – first of all! – Hunan Province in southern China. Before that, an abruptly curbed upbringing in the Appalachian southeast of Ohio, following a half-remembered, half-imagined early upbringing in Suffolk, England. That excludes college in New England, such a strange kaleidoscope of Original England, by which time there was no obvious “home” to return to. I lost the man who raised me at 17.
But where the sharp life transition and lack of obvious anchor thereafter left me with plenty of insecurities, it also let an innate wanderlust run wild. I had the incredible fortune of finding various forms of community across countries and contexts. I had strong senses of love and loss without the senses of tribalism or dependence I saw in many others. I knew my place lay in bridge-building, even if I hadn’t yet figured out how or where.
This couldn’t be more relevant to ambitions for promoting climate progress. So many of the genuinely complex issues inhibiting positive change boil down to some form of “us vs. them,” where “us” is inevitably a smaller group than it should be. Fear of loss is one thing, fear of unknown another; both are understandable. But what I often see is a fear of others doing “better,” seen as rational due to a mistaken belief – most often due to political messaging – that climate progress is zero-sum. It is not.
But nor is politics avoidable, much as I wish it were. Everywhere I have been, every community I’ve had the fortune to see and participate in, has dealt with some version of the same issue – nationally, locally, communally, within the family. And so I specifically work on the *political* economy of climate change – trying to map paths to progress given the political challenges at hand. The challenges? Pretty much everything one might imagine. But it’s worth the pursuit.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know?
As a research consultant and advisor, my position – my reputation – is built on impartial analysis and honest deliberation. By the time I talk to them, clients have usually already faced serious difficulties. Many have been told what they want to hear in the past, and need a clearer picture of what’s to come and how they might navigate it. Companies often don’t want to report up the chain all the things that might need to change; government entities certainly don’t. But those that work with my team know they’ll get genuine engagement and impartial views, reflecting a wide range of perspectives (team members from myriad countries, with different academic and professional backgrounds). Most of my team’s clients started out with trial offerings; I’m proud to say nearly all of them have become long-term partnerships.
Work-wise, my primary focuses are:
• Climate, energy, and industrial policy research, managing an international team of researchers and analysts.
• Building on the above: strategic advisory for government agencies, multinational corporations, and investors. That includes clean energy investments, supply chain decarbonization, and climate policy work. Recently, I’ve also been doing a *ton* on supply chains more broadly, just to help keep industries and investment flowing amid the US-China trade conflict.
Outside of work hours, I’m a nerd trying to make all the work we do have a broader impact:
• Academic climate research
• Public engagement on climate and US-China issues
• Nonprofit advisory in the climate space
• Working on a climate book with a fabulous co-author (still in proposal phase!)
What matters most to you? Why?
The future! Building a future worth inheriting. That’s why I built this odd niche of a career, trying to be a climate person in the thick of industry and government while also engaging academia – all just trying to support tangible progress however possible.
But at a more basic, human level, there’s nothing more fundamental to progress than simple empathy. It’s not only the ethics (which are plenty reason for empathy!); it’s also a practical matter. If I can’t meaningfully understand where someone is coming from – whether a policymaker, a financial institution, a community leader, or even a random acquaintance I’m trying to convince to support climate progress – then I’m missing something I shouldn’t be. Either there’s something I might reconsider of my own positions, or there’s something I can better understand about how to persuade others of what I believe to be a better position. (To be sure, when it comes to climate denialism, or “profit over all else,” or any of a thousand social ills, it’s the latter. But no less important.)
Empathy in the context I mean is not just an emotional process, it’s a fundamentally creative process. Many times I’ve failed to make an effective case for a more constructive outcome, it’s been a failure of imagination. Other times it’s been because I failed to remember that empathy says nothing of agreement, only of the understanding necessary for productive action.
So again: what matters most to me is that we keep making progress toward a future that later generations find worth inheriting. In my case, I work to make economic cases to try to drag politics in more productive directions. But that’s just one part of a much broader global transition that demands attention and support – a just transition that advances equity for all people, that preserves our environment and ecosystems, and so on. None of this happens without continuous, meaningful engagement, even (especially) where it’s the most difficult.
Calling this type of goal “lofty” is beside the point; it’s necessary. It’s also the furthest thing from guaranteed. Which is why, now that I’ve found my weird little niche from which to try to help (I still struggle to summarize the many things my colleagues and I actually work on!) I wouldn’t change it for the world.
Pricing:
- If you’re with a business or investment group: my team offers a variety of services, from subscriptions to retainers and bespoke projects. Visit the Trivium China website or email me to learn more.
- If you’re an academic or nonprofit group, please reach out! I’d love to hear about your work, and would be happy to see if there are ways I can support shared missions.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://triviumchina.com/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cory-combs/
