Menu
southeast

Meet Leigh Pomeroy SE CERT Steering Committee Member

August 2022

By Chris Meyer
Southeast, MN

Leigh PomeroySE CERT Steering Committee member Leigh Pomeroy has followed his passions most of his life, and CERTs is lucky that his current passion is clean energy.

Along with sitting on the Steering Committee since 2018, Leigh is the Board Chair of the Southcentral Minnesota Clean Energy Council (SMCEC), an electric vehicle enthusiast, a residential solar electric array owner, a frequent contributor to his local paper, the Mankato Free Press, and presents at community events.

Leigh says that his story mirrors that of former director of the NASA Goddard Institute of Space Studies James Hansen, whose research on the Venusian atmosphere led him to use those models to better understand and then advocate action to respond to climate change on earth. In Leigh’s case, an energy conference at nearby Gustavus Adolphus College led to his decision to take action. Leigh says, “In my senior years I now have the ability to do this work and not worry about money. I own a plug-in vehicle and have solar panels on my house, and my time and energy are invested in climate change mitigation efforts.” He continues, “Of course, you need to have a balance, so I maintain an interest in wine and travel, plus local foods and healthy exercise.”

Leigh started his career in the wine business, then earned a master’s degree in film and TV, living in California and Colorado and working on screenplays. In 1986, he moved to Mankato and taught film and writing part-time at Minnesota State University, Mankato. He still has an interest in wine, and writes wine columns for Mankato Magazine.

Leigh shares, “I’m an action person. Meetings are fine when I learn something, but I want to work on projects.” Over a decade ago, Mankato held a series of community-wide forums, which led to the formation of two committees, one promoting energy conservation and the other renewable energy. The two merged and became the Region Nine Renewable Energy Task Force.

Over a decade ago, Mankato held a series of community-wide forums, which led to the formation of two committees, one promoting energy conservation and the other renewable energy. The two merged and became the Region Nine Renewable Energy Task Force.

About five years ago, the Task Force found a new home at the South Central Service Cooperative under the name the Southcentral Minnesota Clean Energy Council. The Council hosts monthly forums on sustainability topics related to clean energy and climate change. Leigh maintains their website and, along with other executive board members, recruits speakers and presides over the monthly forums. Interested parties can connect with SMCEC through at www.smcleanenergy.org.

CERTs has partnered on events and seed grant projects with SMCEC over the years. Currently, Gustavus Adolphus College in St. Peter and SMCEC have a West Central CERT seed grant project to engage students within their communities about clean energy.

Leigh’s goals include finding a way to reach those not yet aware that they can save money by saving energy. He notes that “innovators and business will help us solve the problem of climate change. We can’t just rely on government action.” 

“We need to reach people about common energy-saving practices, like energy audits. What if we offered free energy audits to every person and business in the state? Those folks could save money and do the right thing.”

Leigh Pomeroy, SE CERT Steering Committee member

Southeast CERT thanks Leigh for all his work and support of clean energy!

Related Stories

John Suzukida with grandchild
June 2022

A journey into home energy efficiency with John Suzukida

seed grants
January 2022

74 projects receive CERTs 2022 Seed Grants

Sign up for our email newsletter

We encourage reuse and republishing of this story. All Clean Energy Resource Teams stories are made available under the Creative Commons Attribution license, meaning you can share and adapt the work as long as you give us credit. We'd also love it if you link back to the original piece. Have questions or want to chat? Drop us a line.