Denis Hayes

Denis Hayes
Denis Hayes, taken while director of the Solar Energy Research Institute (1979-1981)
Born	Denis Allen Hayes (1944-08-29) August 29, 1944 (age 72) Wisconsin, United States
Alma mater	Stanford University Kennedy School of Government
Occupation	Environmental advocate
Known for	Coordinating the first Earth Day, founding the Earth Day Network, construction of the Bullitt Center

Denis Allen Hayes (born August 29, 1944) is an environmental advocate and proponent of solar power. He rose to prominence in 1970 as the coordinator for the first Earth Day.

Hayes founded the Earth Day Network and expanded it to more than 180 nations. During the Carter Administration, Hayes became head of the Solar Energy Research Institute (now known as the National Renewable Energy Laboratory), but left this position when the Reagan Administration cut funding for the program. Since 1992, Hayes has been president of the Bullitt Foundation in Washington and continues to be a leader in environmental and energy policy. In 2015, he is completing a fellowship at the Robert Bosch Academy to write a book on solar energy.

Hayes has received the national Jefferson Awards Medal for Outstanding Public Service as well as many other awards. Time Magazine named him as "Hero of the Planet" in 1999.

Denis Hayes was born in Wisconsin in 1944, but mainly raised in the small town of Camas, Washington, where in 2007 the Hayes Freedom High School was named in his honor. His experiences growing up in the Pacific Northwest instilled a lifelong love of nature. His father worked at a paper mill on the Columbia River, where both the discharges from the mill and the lack of worker protections showed Hayes the impact of industrialization on both people and the environment.

In 1964, Hayes graduated from Clark Community College in Vancouver, Washington. Hayes received his undergraduate degree in history from Stanford University, where he was president of the student body and an activist against the Vietnam War. During those years, he spent significant time backpacking to remote corners of the world. Hayes later enrolled at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.