Prior to retiring from Xerox in 2012 Patricia A. Calkins was the Global Vice President of Environment, Health, Safety & Sustainability for the Xerox Corporation. She was responsible for developing and implementing sustainability policies and strategies throughout Xerox that helped save hundreds of millions of dollars annually for the company worldwide. She led the Corporation's efforts in forging innovative strategies that advanced Xerox's position as a pioneer in sustainability.
Calkins joined Xerox in 1993 as a manager of resource conservation, developing plans to help the company capture energy and materials savings through more sustainable and efficient processes, facilities and product design. Since then, she has assumed increasingly responsible management positions in quality, business process management and product design, enabling the company to remain at the forefront of driving environmental improvement throughout the value chain.
Before joining Xerox, Calkins began her career as a chemist for AT&T and then moved on to initiate many of the company's sustainability initiatives. During her tenure, she focused on how changes in product and process design could eliminate many environmental changes, including eradicating the use of toxic chemicals in the electronics manufacturing process. For her efforts she was recognized for her engineering excellence. In 1992, she joined Abt Associates as a senior scientist where she worked directly with U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in developing market-based voluntary sustainability programs. She also provided consulting services to corporations developing environmental leadership strategies.
Calkins earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in biology from Merrimack College, North Andover, Massachusetts and a Master of Science degree in civil/environmental engineering from Tufts University. In 2001, she received an M.B.A. from the University of Rochester. Calkins currently serves as a member of several advisory boards including the Golisano Institute for Sustainability at the Rochester Institute of Technology, the University of Michigan's Center for Sustainable Systems and the Wharton Initiative for Global Environmental Leadership and is a Trustee for the Central and Western New York Chapter of the Nature Conservancy.