James Ehrlich

Prof. James Ehrlich is Director of Compassionate Sustainability at the Stanford University School of Medicine Center for Compassion, Altruism Research and Education (CCARE). Additionally, James Ehrlich is appointed affiliate at Stanford Woods Institute – Human and Planetary Health, is Senior Fellow at NASA Ames Research Center, appointed faculty at Singularity University, and a former White House OSTP Appointee to a joint taskforce on AI integrated Regenerative Infrastructure.

James is also the Founder of ReGen Villages Holding, B.V. a Stanford University impact company founded in the Netherlands, using post-doctorate research applied to opensource AI and machine learning for the generative design and autonomous operation of climate-adaptable and resilient housing developments around the world.

Ehrlich's vision behind the development of the VillageOS™ opensource software is to apply generative design for the integration of clean water, renewable energy micro-grids, high-yield organic food production, and circular nutritional flows at the neighborhood scale. Giving landowners, residential developers, municipal and regional governments a freely accessible and easy-to-use platform for planning climate/resource resilient communities. The VillageOS™ is the founding orchestration layer of the Global Opensource Consortium, which integrates opensource and open science research in support of a new asset class based on risk resilience and disaster avoidance. The Global Opensource Consortium focus is to democratize low-power AI that supports community adaptability and productivity, contributing to local/regional supply chain security and nation-state stability.

A serial entrepreneur in Silicon Valley for over 25-years, James successfully founded and managed technology and media companies in motion picture special effects software and video game tools and designs for Atari, Nintendo, Sega, and 3DO. For nearly a decade, Mr. Ehrlich executive produced an award-winning national public broadcasting (PBS) television series based on his case study research of organic and bio-dynamic family farms, that at its apex reached over 35-million homes each week.

James is a graduate from New York University in computer science, and Mechanical Engineering from Stanford University under Prof. Larry Leifer at the Center for Design Research. He has won several awards for sustainable design and is a researcher and global lecturer on the topic of AI, Machine Learning and regenerative neighborhood development. He has co-authored two (2) U.N. Sustainable Development Goal Platform Briefs (2015/2018) with Prof. Larry Leifer and Chris Ford, PhD, AIA from the Center for Design Research at Stanford University. In 2025 co-authored “Designing the Smart Oasis of Tomorrow: A Project-Based Approach to Climate Resiliency and AI Literacy in Riyadh” Authors: Shuhai Li, Roozbeh Aliabadi, Alexandra Albinus, James Ehrlich Compass ’25: Proceeds of the ACM SIGCAS/SIGCHI Conference on Computing and Sustainable Societies

James Ehrlich has been featured in the New York Times, BBC, Guardian, Reuters, South China Morning Post, San Francisco Chronicle, World Economic Forum, and countless other major news and media outlets. James is a featured keynote speaker, presenter, panelist, moderator, and workshop leader invited to top conferences, symposia, forums, and universities around the world.