Sarah Merricks is a strategic leader with deep expertise in building decarbonization, green building certification, integrated marketing and media and organizational strategy within the sustainability sector.
Sarah is widely recognized for convening cross-industry leaders to accelerate practical, scalable climate solutions that generate measurable and replicable impact. Through years of leadership in the green building, sustainable cities and net zero movements, she identified a critical barrier to progress: fragmentation across sectors, standards, and stakeholders. Her work is centered on building the connective infrastructure that aligns organizations around shared frameworks, shared accountability, and shared results.
As Chief Strategy Officer and Co-Founder of the Global Network for Zero (GNFZ), she leads the strategy that transforms ambition into verified net zero outcomes, advancing credible, cross-sector climate action worldwide. Sarah leads enterprise strategy, market positioning, and strategic partnerships. She plays a central role in GNFZ’s approach to climate action including driving certification frameworks, coalition strategy, and scalable market adoption of credible net zero solutions.
Prior to co-founding GNFZ with CEO Mahesh Ramanujam, Sarah spent nearly nine years at the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) and Green Business Certification Inc. (GBCI), helping to rapidly scale LEED’s global footprint. She played a central role in translating strategic vision into market execution, including leading international marketing for LEED across 182 countries, overseeing GBCI’s portfolio of rating systems and credentials, and supporting the growth of the Arc performance platform. She also helped launch more than a dozen products that accelerated sustainability adoption across the built environment.
Sarah’s environmental leadership predates her time at GNFZ, USGBC and GBCI spanning policy, legislative, and legal experience. She advanced clean energy research at a national think tank, supported congressional climate initiatives, and conducted environmental legal research.