Dr. Diana Hernández is a tenured Associate Professor at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, the Founding Principal Investigator of the Energy Equity, Housing and Health Program and co-Director of the Energy Opportunity Lab at the Center on Global Energy Policy. For the 2025–2026 academic year, she is a Climate Justice Fellow at Harvard University’s Radcliffe and Salata Institutes. A pioneering sociologist, Professor Hernández has advanced the concept of energy insecurity through innovative mixed-methods research, community partnerships, and policy interventions. She is the lead author of Powerless: The People’s Struggle for Energy (Russell Sage, 2025), the first and most prominent book on energy insecurity in the US. Her current projects include the “Cities Uniting to Reduce Energy Insecurity” (CUREi) initiative, statewide measurement of energy inequities in New York, and clinical collaborations linking energy insecurity screening with various health outcomes.