Our People
CMEW Co-Directors
James W. Boyd, Senior Fellow and Co-Director, Center for the Management of Ecological Wealth
Jim Boyd is co-director of CMEW. An economist, his work lies at the intersection of economics, ecology, and law, with a particular focus on the measurement and management of ecosystem goods and services. As a research manager, he emphasizes coordinated economic and ecological research to improve the practical performance of green incentives, markets, and investments. Boyd holds a Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. He was director of the Energy and Natural Resources Division at Resources for the Future from 2002 to 2007 and has been a visiting professor at Stanford University and Washington University in St. Louis.
Lynn Scarlett, Visiting Scholar and Co-Director, Center for the Management of Ecological Wealth
As the former Deputy Secretary of the U.S. Department of the Interior, Lynn Scarlett served as Interior’s Chief Operating Officer, chaired its Climate Change Task Force, and chaired a federal government Cooperative Conservation Task Force. She served as Acting Secretary of the Interior in 2006. She now co-directs RFF’s Center for the Management of Ecological Wealth (CMEW), working on issues pertaining to ecosystem services, landscape-scale conservation, water, and climate adaptation. She co-chairs a Large Landscape Conservation Practitioners Network. Scarlett received her B.A. and M.A. in political science from the University of California, Santa Barbara, where she also completed her Ph.D. coursework and exams in political science.
To learn more about Scarlett’s work, you can also visit her personal website.
CMEW Staff
Anna Brittain, Center Manager
Anna has a broad background, ranging from green building advocacy to researching regional, national, and international climate change impacts and adaptation strategies. She spent several years working as a green business consultant in Northern California, and also served as a research fellow with the Institute for Governance and Sustainable Development in Geneva. Anna holds a B.A. in political science and environmental studies from Williams College and an M.S. in environmental science & management from the Bren School at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
RFF CMEW Experts
Allen Blackman, Senior Fellow
Rebecca Epanchin-Neill, Fellow
Carolyn Fischer, Senior Fellow
Carolyn Kousky, Fellow
Alan Krupnick, Senior Fellow and Director, Center for Energy Economics and Policy
Yusuke Kuwayama, Fellow
Molly Macauley, Vice President for Research and Senior Fellow
Sheila Olmstead, Senior Fellow
James Sanchirico, Nonresident Fellow
Roger Sedjo, Senior Fellow and Director, Forest and Economics Policy Program
Leonard Shabman, Resident Scholar
Jhih-Shyang Shih, Fellow
Juha Siikamäki, Associate Research Director and Fellow
Margaret A. Walls, Research Director and Thomas J. Klutznick Senior Fellow
Jintao Xu, Gilbert White Fellow
Allen Blackman is an expert on environmental and natural resource policy in developing countries. He focuses on industrial pollution control and tropical deforestation in Latin America and Asia. His research on tropical deforestation assesses agroforestry systems and conservation policies such as protected areas and payments for environmental services programs.
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Rebecca Epanchin-Neill specializes in ecosystem management, particularly understanding how human behavior affects ecological resources and identifying strategies to improve management. Much of her work has focused on invasive species, including strategies to control established invaders, improving monitoring strategies, and cooperative management. She also has examined the role of restoration for reducing long-term fire threats and management costs in the western United States and the effects of rural residential development on plants and animals.
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Carolyn Fischer addresses issues of biotechnology, eco-labeling, invasive species, and wildlife conservation, with particular emphasis on the opportunities and challenges posed by international trade.
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Carolyn Kousky is interested in ecosystem services policy, particularly the use of natural capital to reduce vulnerability to weather-related disasters. Much of her research focuses on individual and societal responses to natural disaster risk. She has studied the demand and supply of disaster insurance, land-use policy for adapting to changes in extreme precipitation events, and national floodplain management policies. She has also researched the design of incentive-based mechanisms to supply ecosystem services.
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Alan Krupnick is a leading authority on estimating the benefits of environmental policies. He brings expertise on eliciting preferences for health and environmental improvements as well as establishing accurate valuation of environmental benefits. By creating improved methods for estimating the willingness-to-pay for health and environmental improvements, he aims to provide credible monetary values for use by governments and other practitioners worldwide.
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Yusuke Kuwayama focuses on the economics of environmental regulation, with an emphasis on water resources and ecosystems. His recent work analyzes the cost effectiveness of policies to manage spatially heterogeneous externalities from agricultural water use, the implications of time lags and uncertainty on the optimal design of tradable permit systems, and the potential for hydrologic models to inform the choice of strategies to control groundwater pollution.
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Molly Macauley focuses on how the value of information, especially as derived from earth-observing satellites, is critical to the development of new research on ecological wealth and the development of green GDP regimes.
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Sheila Olmstead focuses on water resource economics, including urban water demand management, market-based approaches to water conservation, drinking water quality regulation, access to drinking water among low-income populations, and the efficient allocation of water across sectors. Her current work investigates the impacts of information disclosure on drinking water quality violations, the influence of federal fire-suppression policy on land development in the American West, water quality impacts and other environmental risks from shale gas development, and international cooperation and conflict over water.
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James Sanchirico analyzes the economic factors involved in managing living biological resources (such as fisheries) and ecosystem biodiversity, with an emphasis on protected marine areas. An overarching theme in his marine research is the potential benefits and costs of zoning the oceans. His other research interests include spatial and intertemporal management of biological resources, the interface between land use and biodiversity conservation, and the economics of invasive species management.
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Roger Sedjo is an expert on forest economics and policy, including public and private forestland management and international forestry. His work involves issues of wood as a commodity, biomass energy, and the intersection of forests and climate. Sedjo was an author on forests and climate in three of the IPCC Assessment Reports. His work provides a conduit to the broader forest policy and industry communities.
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Leonard Shabman holds a joint appointment with RFF and is a visiting scholar at the Corps of Engineers, Institute for Water Resources. His ability to bring technical analysis to practical policy design is sought after by water management organizations across the nation, including his expertise in market-like program design for ecosystem restoration and water quality management, and decision support for investments in water supply, water quality and flood risk management.
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Jhih-Shyang Shih has a unique perspective as an environmental systems engineer and economist, enabling him to serve as a bridge between the science, engineering, economics, and policy disciplines. He recently developed the SPAtially Referenced Regression on Watershed Attributes (SPARROW) water quality model for the U.S. Geologic Survey (USGS), which represents how varied land use affects water quality throughout a watershed.
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Juha Siikamäki focuses on evaluating the benefits, costs, and cost-effectiveness of different environmental policy options. His work seeks to help governments and other organizations make prudent decisions about the use and conservation of nature and to effectively invest in it. He was integral to RFF’s participation in the Outdoor Resources Review Group, examining trends in recreational land use and new issues affecting recreation, conservation, and open space. Further, he has developed approaches to improve the cost-effectiveness of the protection of endangered species, particularly Pacific salmon.
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Margaret Walls focuses on finding practical and effective uses of land through analysis of policies such as transferable development rights, development impact fees, and creative zoning rules. She led RFF’s participation in the Outdoor Resources Review Group which examined trends in recreational land use and new issues affecting recreation, conservation, and open space.
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