Riley Smith joined the API’s Market Development Group as the Policy Advisor for Global Gas & LNG in March 2020. In this role he leads the Market Development Committee's Global Gas & LNG Workgroup and serves as the point person at API for global natural gas and LNG issues. Riley is responsible for assessing how existing and emerging regulatory regimes in priority countries and regions could affect market access for U.S. LNG, as well as devising advocacy strategies to address these regulatory bottlenecks.

Prior to joining API, he was the Director for Mainland Southeast Asia, ASEAN, and Energy at the US-ASEAN Business Council from August 2018 to February 2020. As a Director, he managed teams in Washington, DC; Bangkok, Thailand; Hanoi, Vietnam; Jakarta, Indonesia; and Yangon, Myanmar in planning and executing business advocacy and revenue-generating programs for more than 160 member companies. Riley first joined the Council in 2016 as a Manager covering energy, the Philippines, and Singapore.

Before joining the Council, Riley was a Senior Intelligence Analyst at iJET International, which was a global risk advisory firm based in Annapolis, Maryland. As a member of iJET’s Executive Decision Support (XDS) division from 2013 to 2015, he served as a dedicated analyst for one of the Big Four auditing firms and a Fortune Global 500 pharmaceutical company, providing analysis on how political, economic and security developments could affect the firms’ business operations around the world. Prior to that, Riley worked in the World Bank’s Global Watch Office, where he helped coordinate communications between country offices and the World Bank’s headquarters during crises, including natural disasters, coups and terrorist attacks.

Riley has an M.A. in International Relations and International Economics from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. He also holds an M.S. and a B.S. in Biomedical Engineering from Washington University in St. Louis. He is currently pursuing an MBA at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.