SAN JOSE, Calif. — Silicon Valley venture capitalist John Doerr, an early investor in Google, Amazon and other leading tech companies, and his wife, Ann, have agreed to donate $1.1 billion to Stanford University to set up a new school devoted to the study of climate change and its solutions.
The gift, announced Wednesday, is the largest in Stanford history. It ranks as the second-largest donation to any university in American history, behind $1.8 billion that former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg gave to his alma mater, Johns Hopkins University, in 2018.
The school is expected to propel Stanford, which already has considerable facilities researching energy and the environment, to the forefront of climate research among the world’s universities. It will be called the Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability.
