Eleni Myrivili

Dr. Eleni "Lenio" Myrivili is Global Chief Heat Officer for the Atlantic Council’s Climate Resilience Center and the UN-Habitat. Dedicated to fostering heat resilience in cities worldwide, she was recognized among Nature’s 10 people who helped shape science in 2023, as well as Earth.Org’s Ten Women Leading the Fight Against Climate Change in 2023, and PlanetMark’s 10 Inspirational Female Voices in the Climate Race in 2024.

She is a member of the EU Mission Board for Adaptation at the European Commission, a Heat Resilience Advisor to the Global Covenant of Mayors (GCoM), serves on the Advisory Board for the WEF Global Risks Report, and a member of WEF’s Global Future Council for the Future Economics of Equitable Transition. Myrivili is currently a Perry World House Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania, where she was honored a year ago with the Lawrence C. Nussdorf Urban Leadership Prize. She was also a resident Loeb Fellow in Advanced Environmental Studies at Harvard University Graduate School of Design in 2020.

Myrivili was elected to the Athens city government from 2014 to 2019 and appointed Deputy Mayor for Urban Nature, Urban Resilience, and Climate Adaptation. During that time, she spearheaded the city’s Urban Resilience and Climate Adaptation Plan, anchoring 55m from EIB, and then led its implementation. Over the past decade, she has also held the roles of Chief Heat Officer and Chief Resilience Officer for the City of Athens, collaborated as a heat expert with the World Bank, and co-chaired the Steering Committee of the Resilient Cities Network. Her efforts in advancing heat resilience have established Athens as one of the leading cities in building heat resilience.

Dr. Myrivili's heat resilience expertise has earned her international recognition, including a TEDtalk Global and an invitation to speak to the House of Commons in British Parliament, while she features in prominent media outlets like CNN, NHK World, the New York Times, Monocle, and Politico.eu where she was part of Politico's 28 list for 2022 of most influential Europeans. Formerly, she was a tenured University Professor and holds a Ph.D. in Anthropology from Columbia University.