Rob Watson ’06BUS
Founder & Co-chair
SWEEP Standards
Rob Watson, LEED Fellow, is an international leader in market transformation toward sustainability whose expertise ranges from energy efficiency, utility demand side management, integrated resource planning, and state and international energy policy to green buildings, sustainable urban mobility, and zero waste management; he is best known as the “Founding Father of LEED.” Under Rob’s direction, LEED became the largest and fastest-growing international standard by which green buildings are measured. Author Thomas Friedman called Rob “one of the best environmental minds in America.” In 2019, Dartmouth Alumni Magazine recognized Mr. Watson as one of the “25 Most Influential Alumni” in the college’s 250-year history.
In addition to Green buildings, his work in market transformation has led him to address the challenge of recycling and solid waste as chief sustainability officer of EcoHub LLC, an innovative developer of waste separation and processing complexes that can separate and transform 95 percent of the incoming waste stream into innovative 21st century materials, renewable, carbon neutral energy, high-nutrient fertilizer, and pure drinking water. At EcoHub, Rob is responsible for technology and economic assessment, project development, and business development.
As part of his market transformation approach to solid waste, in 2016 Mr. Watson launched SWEEP, the Solid Waste Environmental Excellence Performance, a comprehensive environmental performance standard for municipal solid waste programs and private companies in the solid waste industry. Rob has been recognized as an international Be Waste Wise Pioneer from 2016–2018.