He is currently a nonresident senior fellow with the Atlantic Council after retiring in 2024 as the chief environmental officer of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management in the Department of the Interior.

Brown was born in Artesia, California, on August 13, 1948, and graduated from high school in Brazil at the Escola Americana do Recife.

Brown left government in 1981 with a change in administration, joining the Environmental Defense Fund where he served as senior scientist and attorney and acting executive director until 1985.

There, he advocated, wrote and negotiated executive orders for coral reef protection and invasive species management issued by President William Clinton and orders of Secretary Bruce Babbitt establishing marine national wildlife refuges for Navassa Island off Haiti and Palmyra Atoll and Kingman Reef south of Hawaii.

He was a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution from June 2011 until November 2013, when he was appointed the chief environmental officer of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.