The Natural Capital Project is led by an interdisciplinary team of core scientists and project leaders from Stanford, The Nature Conservancy, World Wildlife Fund, and the University of Minnesota. Strategic advisors and collaborators come from these four partner organizations as well as other institutions.
Directors
Gretchen Daily, Ph.D.
Professor of Biology
Senior Fellow, Woods Institute for the Environment, Stanford University
Gretchen Daily, an ecologist whose work ranges from conservation science to environmental policy analysis to public outreach, is one of the founders of the Natural Capital Project and serves as its chief emissary to financial and government leaders. She is working to develop a scientific basis - and political and institutional support - for managing Earth's life-support systems. She has published ~200 scientific and popular articles and her most recent books are The New Economy of Nature: The Quest to Make Conservation Profitable, with journalist Katherine Ellison, and Natural Capital: Theory and Practice of Mapping Ecosystem Services, co-edited with several colleagues. She serves on the boards of The Nature Conservancy (and its Science Council) and the Beijer International Institute for Ecological Economics, and at Stanford she is Director of the Center for Conservation Biology.
Peter Kareiva, Ph.D.
Chief Scientist, The Nature Conservancy
Natural Capital Project co-founder Peter Kareiva is the project’s liaison with The Nature Conservancy, while also offering strategic vision and leadership. Kareiva’s interests encompass agriculture, conservation, ecology, and the interface of science and policy. In addition to a long academic career, including faculty positions at Brown University, the University of California at Santa Barbara and elsewhere, he worked for NOAA Fisheries for three years, and was Director of the Northwest Fisheries Science Center Conservation Biology Division. Academically, Kareiva is best known for contributions to insect ecology, landscape ecology, risk analysis, mathematical biology, and conservation. His current projects emphasize the interplay of human land-use and biodiversity, resilience in the face of global change, and evidence-based conservation.
Steve Polasky, Ph.D.
Professor of Ecological/Environmental Economics, University of Minnesota
Steve Polasky is one of the leaders of the Natural Capital Project’s environmental service mapping and valuation effort. At the University of Minnesota, Polasky holds the Fesler-Lampert Chair in Ecological/Environmental Economics. His research interests include biodiversity conservation, environmental services, integrating ecological and economic analysis, renewable energy, and game theory. Polasky was the senior staff economist for environment and resources for the President’s Council of Economic Advisers from 1998-1999, and served as associate editor and co-editor for the Journal of Environmental Economics and Management from 1996 to 2002. Today he’s a member of the Environmental Economics Advisory Committee and the Committee on Valuing the Protection of Ecological Systems and Services for the Science Advisory Board of U.S. EPA and a member of The Nature Conservancy's Science Council.
Taylor Ricketts, Ph.D.
Director of Conservation Science, World Wildlife Fund
Natural Capital Project co-founder Taylor Ricketts is the project’s liaison with World Wildlife Fund, and, like Kareiva, provides strategic guidance. His interests span a broad range of topics in ecology and conservation biology, from global analyses of biodiversity patterns to field studies on the ecological and economic effects of land-use change. Ricketts led WWF’s conservation assessment of North American eco-regions, the first in a continuing series published by Island Press. Ricketts’ current research focuses on the agricultural value of wild pollinators and their habitats, and on mapping the economic costs and benefits of conservation. He received his Ph.D. from Stanford University and has been recognized with awards from the Society for Conservation Biology, the National Science Foundation, the Summit Foundation, and others.
Mary Ruckelshaus, Ph.D.
Managing Director
Mary Ruckelshaus oversees all work of the Natural Capital Project partnership including strategy, coordination, fundraising, communications, and hiring. She is based in Seattle, WA, where she was a staff scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries Service for 13 years. Prior to that, she was an assistant professor of biological sciences at The Florida State University (1994-1997). The main focus of her recent work is on developing ecological models including estimates of the flow of environmental services under different management regimes in marine systems worldwide. Ruckelshaus serves on the board of The Nature Conservancy (and its Science Council), is a Trustee on The Nature Conservancy's Washington Board, and is a past chair of the Science Advisory Board of the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS). Ruckelshaus has also been chief scientist for the Puget Sound Partnership, a public-private institution charged with achieving recovery of the Puget Sound terrestrial, freshwater and marine ecosystems. Ruckelshaus has a bachelor's degree in human biology from Stanford University, a master's degree in fisheries from the University of Washington, and a doctoral degree in botany, also from Washington.
Team
Katie Arkema, Ph.D.
Marine Ecologist
Katie Arkema is working on Marine InVEST, a set of models for quantifying the services provided by coastal and marine ecosystems. Arkema's research interests include community ecology, biophysical-coupling in nearshore habitats, marine ecosystem-based management, and land-sea interactions. Arkema received her Ph.D. from the Department of Ecology, Evolution and Marine Biology at the University of California, Santa Barbara and her B.A. in ecology with a minor in Latin American studies from Princeton University.
Nirmal Bhagabati
Senior Program Officer (Environmental Services), World Wildlife Fund (WWF-US) Conservation Science Program
Nirmal Bhagabati leads WWF's applications of InVEST, an ecosystem services mapping and valuation software package developed by the Natural Capital Project, in priority sites in Southeast Asia, Africa and Latin America. After completing undergraduate work in India in biology and computer science, he obtained his PhD at the State University of New York, for which he studied geographic variation in birds (Mexican Jays) in the southwestern US and northern Mexico. Subsequently, he was a visiting scientist at the Smithsonian Institution, and then worked as a bioinformatics analyst at The Institute for Genomic Research, where he developed software, analyzed data and trained biologists in data analysis. Nirmal also completed a degree in Sustainable Development and Conservation Biology from the University of Maryland. Prior to joining WWF, he worked with several environmental organizations, including the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, Conservation International, the National Wildlife Federation and World Wildlife Fund, on diverse projects including GIS-based analyses of human dimensions of conservation, biofuels, tropical deforestation and climate change policy, and landscape-level conservation planning.
Becky Chaplin-Kramer, Ph.D.
Lead - Model Applications and Agricultural Model Development
Becky Chaplin-Kramer is leading efforts to improve user experience and the way InVEST is applied in decision-making. She is also the lead modeler for ecosystem services from and to agricultural systems. Her past work has combined conducting field experiments, modeling, and coordinating between researchers and practitioners at regional and local scales, through agricultural extension programs and the California Energy Commission's Public Interest Energy Research program on climate change. Becky Chaplin-Kramer is passionate about preserving ecosystems embedded in working landscapes and forging new alliances between conservationists and farmers, ranchers, and other land stewards. She earned her Ph.D. from University of California in Environmental Science, Policy & Management, and her M.S. and B.S. from Stanford University in Earth Systems Science.
Marc Conte, Ph.D.
Economist
Marc Conte is developing and applying environmental service valuation models with the Natural Capital Project. He is particularly interested in the impact of policy mechanism choice on the magnitude and location of service provision across the landscape. Conte received a Ph.D. from the Bren School of Environmental Science and Management at the University of California, Santa Barbara as a fellow in the NSF-funded Economics and Environmental Science IGERT program.
Douglas Denu
Software Engineer and GIS Analyst
Douglas Denu is a member of the Software Team, helping with the visualization of making InVEST platform independent. His goal is to get his Ph.D. in computer science, focusing on modeling and algorithms. He also has a strong interest and minor background in geology, which he hopes to merge with his computer science degree. He received his Bachelor degree in Computer Science with a minor in math at St. Lawrence University.
James Douglass
Software Engineer
As a member of the Software Team, James Douglass works to support the existing InVEST family of tools, implement new models and reimplement existing models in an ArcGIS-independent platform. Douglass is also heavily involved with the development of a user interface for InVEST. He received his B.S in Computer Science at St. Lawrence University.
Brad Eichelberger
GIS Analyst
Brad Eichelberger is part of a team that is adapting and applying InVEST at three Department of Defense demonstration sites to inform their resource management and land-use policy. He is applying and altering existing InVEST tools to meet the land manager's goals and has worked closely with the hydrology team to develop the freshwater InVEST models. Prior to joining the Natural Capital Project, he was an ecologist with the Natural Heritage Program in Pennsylvania and conducted research on rare species and associated habitat. Brad earned his M.S in applied ecology and conservation biology and a B.S. in biology from Frostburg State University and has received ESRI's Special Achievements in GIS award for his previous work.
Yonas Ghile, Ph.D
Lead Hydrologist
Yonas Ghile is leading the development of water models for the Natural Capital Project. He has extensive experience working on a wide array of water, climate and the environment. Prior to joining the Natural Capital Project he was a senior research associate at the University of Massachusetts and has carried out a number of research projects in the USA, Africa and Asia to address the contemporary global issues of extreme hydrological events, climate change and environmental degradation. In addition to his research experiences, he developed practical tools for flood risk prediction and climate risk assessment. His research interest include hydrologic predictability and river basin management tools, flood forecasting, water allocation mechanisms, transboundary river issues, water economics and policies, managing climate risks and decision scaling. He earned a Ph.D. in Hydrology from University of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa and has won several fellowships.
Greg Guannel, Ph.D.
Coastal Engineer
Greg Guannel is part of the Natural Capital's Marine Initiative, developing Marine InVEST's coastal protection module. Guannel's research involves the incorporation of natural habitat in the modeling of nearshore hydrodynamics as well as short- and long-term shoreline change. Greg received his Civil Engineer Degree from Ecole Superieure des Travaux Publics in Paris, France, his M.S. in Ocean Engineering from Texas A&M University, and his Ph.D. in Civil Engineering from Oregon State University.
Anne Guerry, Ph.D.
Lead Scientist, Marine Initiative
Anne Guerry is the Lead Scientist (with Mary Ruckelshaus) on the Natural Capital Project's Marine Initiative. Building on the success of the terrestrial InVEST tool, the marine team is building Marine InVEST, an environmental services scenario assessment tool for marine and coastal systems. Beyond environmental services, Anne's primary research interests are in community ecology, rocky intertidal systems, and ecosystem-based management. She received her PhD in zoology from Oregon State University, her MS in wildlife ecology from the University of Maine, and her BA in Environmental Studies and English from Yale University.
Gail Kaiser
Finance, Grants & Operations Manager
Gail Kaiser manages the Natural Capital Project's finance, grants and operations, combining her Silicon Valley experience as a product manager and consultant for globally dispersed product development and marketing, and volunteer work in local natural resource preservation. She has worked for IBM, Siemens, HP, and is on the board of the Committee for Green Foothills. She received her MBA and BS in Economics from Santa Clara University.
Bonnie Keeler
Graduate Researcher
Bonnie Keeler works on ecosystem service assessment and valuation as a Ph.D. student at the University of Minnesota. Her research addresses the need for improved valuation of water quality-related services and better integration of biophysical and economic models to aid decision-making. She is also involved in projects assessing the economic and environmental consequences of bioenergy production in agricultural watersheds in the Midwestern U.S. Ms. Keeler received her M.S. in Ecology from the University of Minnesota and her B.A. in Biology from The Colorado College.
Choong-Ki (CK) Kim, Ph.D.
Oceanographer
CK Kim is developing biological-physical coupled models for the Natural Capital Project to value the environmental services provided by coastal and marine ecosystems. He has worked extensively in numerical modeling studies with scales ranging from an estuary to a regional ocean. The focus has been on hydrodynamics, thermal discharge effects, air-sea interaction, storm surge prediction, transport processes of marine organisms, and coupled biological-physical processes. His most recent work covered Mobile Bay and the Gulf of Mexico. Earlier work examined the Yellow Sea and Korea's South and East Seas. Kim received a Masters Degree in Oceanography from Inha University in South Korea and a Ph.D. in Marine Sciences from the University of South Alabama.
Kent Kovacs, Ph.D.
Economist
Kovacs is developing and applying environmental service valuation models with the University of Minnesota. He developed a passion for economics related to spatial resource use and non-market valuation while in graduate school at the University of California, Davis where he got his Ph.D. Kovacs continued to develop his research interests when he was a research assistant professor at the University of Nevada, Reno where he studied forest invasive species.
Martin Lacayo
Software Engineer and GIS Analyst
Martin Lacayo develops the Marine InVEST tools, a set of models for quantifying the services provided by coastal and marine ecosystems. His work focuses primarily on automating GIS processes for conservation modeling and improving the usability of spatial decision support tools. He received his M.S. from the Department of Geography at the San Diego State University and his B.A. in Computer Science from Macalester College.
Shan Ma, Ph.D.
Economist
Shan Ma is part of a team adapting and applying InVEST at three Department of Defense demonstration sites to inform their resource management and land-use policy. In particular, she is leading the valuation of different ecosystem services of interest at the installations. Her research interests lie in non-market valuation of ecosystem services and its implications for real-world policy. Shan Ma earned her Ph.D. and M.S in agricultural, food and resource economics from Michigan State University, and a bachelor's degree in environmental economics and management from Renmin University of China. Shan Ma was a Mirzayan Science Policy Fellow with the Board on Agricultural and Natural Resources at the National Academies before joining the Natural Capital Project.
Matthew Marsik, Ph.D.
Hydrologist and GIS Specialist
Matt Marsik is a post-doc research hydrologist funded under a NSF-NOAA CAMEO grant to build InVEST water yield and nutrient models to evaluate tradeoffs between terrestrial and marine management strategies in Puget Sound, Chesapeake Bay, and Galveston Bay. Marsik is a physical geographer specializing in surface hydrology modeling, climate variability, land cover change, GIS and remote sensing. Relevant experience includes land cover modeling of the central Puget Sound; land cover analysis in the southwestern Amazon; hydrologic modeling and climate analysis in Costa Rica; and spatial and temporal scaling of Landsat imagery in north-central Florida. Marsik received his PhD and MSc in Geography and a BSc in Geological Sciences, from the University of Florida.
Emily McKenzie
Lead - Science-Policy Interface
Emily manages the Natural Capital Project (NatCap) at WWF-US and leads NatCap's work at the science-policy interface. Emily's research interests include environmental valuation, and policies and payments for environmental services. She has applied environmental economics to important policy questions in more than sixteen countries in Asia, Europe, Africa, the Pacific, Caribbean and Latin America. Her research has led to nature's benefits being considered in decisions around land use planning in Indonesia, black pearl farming in the Cook Islands, aggregates extraction in the Marshall Islands, coral reef protection in Bermuda and forest biodiversity in Montserrat. She has built several environmental economics programs - leading research, developing tools, building capacity and providing technical and policy advice. She previously worked as Environmental Economics Advisor to the UK government, based at the Joint Nature Conservation Committee. In 2003-2005, she was awarded an Overseas Development Institute Fellowship as the Resource Economist at the Pacific Applied Geoscience Commission in Fiji. Emily received a Masters Degree in International Policy Studies from Stanford University, and a Bachelors Degree in Economics from Cambridge University.
Nasser Olwero
GIS Manager, World Wildlife Fund (WWF-US) Conservation Science Program
Nasser Olwero oversees WWF US Geographic Information Systems (GIS) program including managing the GIS lab and providing GIS and RS support to the Conservation Science Program. He graduated from Moi University in Kenya (undergraduate and postgraduate) with an M.Phil. degree in Environmental Science majoring in Environmental Information Systems.
Elizabeth Rauer
Communications Manager
Elizabeth Rauer is the Communications Manager for the Natural Capital Project. Ms. Rauer graduated from Brown University with a B.S. in Marine Biology, completed Duke University's Beaufort to Bermuda marine science and policy program, and received her master's degree in Marine Affairs and Policy from the Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science (RSMAS) at the University of Miami. Her thesis examined reducing sea lion predation at Bonneville Dam and the biological, social, and economic factors associated with the conflict. She has also conducted research on red tides, sustainable seafood programs, and the diving behavior and physiology of turtles. Before joining the Natural Capital Project, she worked on marine protected areas, sustainable seafood, marine mammal conservation, and historical marine ecology as a Conservation Scientist and Communications Manager at Marine Conservation Institute.
Jim Regetz, Ph.D.
Scientific Programmer/Analyst, National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS)
Jim Regetz is working with the Natural Capital Project team to develop a consistent vision for building and implementing InVEST models. At NCEAS, he consults with a broad array of scientists facing quantitative and computational challenges. His research activities all share a common thread of data analysis, modeling, and information management, with past projects including topics such as science planning for endangered species, salmon population dynamics, and crop pollination services. Regetz received a Masters degree in Environmental Science and Management from the University of California at Santa Barbara, and his Ph.D. in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology from Princeton University.
Amy Rosenthal
Science-Policy Interface Specialist
Amy Rosenthal is working with the team and partner sites to create science-policy interface tools that integrate environmental services into decisions about land management and development. Previously, she helped the Amazon Conservation Association establish an environmental services program, designed major initiatives for conservation of the Western Amazon, and developed a series of tools and methodologies for avoided deforestation carbon projects. She has run an environmental management training program with the Federal University of Acre in Brazil, evaluated a leadership institute for First Nations students with the Woods Institute for the Environment at Stanford, represented book authors as a literary agent, and studied carbon farming on Maori land in New Zealand. Rosenthal received an MA from Stanford University and a BA from Amherst College.
James Salzman
Professor of Law, Duke University
James Salzman is leading development of the Natural Capital Project's policy and finance tools. At Duke, he holds joint appointments as Professor of Law and as the Nicholas Institute Professor of Environmental Policy. In dozens of academic articles, he has addressed topics spanning trade and environment conflicts, the history of drinking water management, and wetlands mitigation banking. He has also written extensively on the legal and institutional issues involved in creating markets for environmental services. From 1998-2000, he was the Principal Investigator on an EPA STAR grant exploring the statutory authority for EPA to conserve environmental services. From 2002-2003, he served as a Fulbright Senior Scholar in Australia, working with the Sydney Catchment Authority to develop an environmental services market for water purification.
M.A. Sanjayan, Ph.D.
Lead Scientist, The Nature Conservancy
M.A. Sanjayan is spearheading the Natural Capital Project’s efforts to use environmental services approaches to improve the lives of the poor. Collaborating with scientists and conservationists, he is specifically attempting to improve understanding of African eco-regions and of threats such as climate change and private land development to successful conservation. Born in Sri Lanka, Sanjayan grew up in Africa and completed his PhD at the University of California, Santa Cruz. After a stint at the World Bank, he joined TNC in 1999, first as the Director of Science for the California Program, and later as one of TNC’s three Lead Scientists. He has a faculty appointment at University of Montana, where he occasionally teaches graduate seminar classes.
Manu Sharma
Water Resources Analyst
Manu Sharma tests and develops water models for the Natural Capital Project. He has four years of hydrologic modeling experience with a focus on climate change impacts on the hydrologic condition of watersheds. He previously worked in consulting as Water Resources Engineer and Hydrogeologist. He earned a Masters degree in Civil Engineering with a specialization in Water Resources Engineering from McMaster University in Canada.
Rich Sharp, Ph.D.
Lead Software Developer
Rich is leading InVEST platform software development and manages the Natural Capital Project software team. His research interests include high performance computing applications, cloud computing, computational interpretive dance, and scientific visualization and computing. He received his Ph.D. in computer science from The Ohio State University and has worked as a professor at St. Lawrence University.
Jess Silver
Research Assistant
Jess Silver is a research assistant for the Natural Capital Project's Marine Initiative. The team is building Marine InVEST, a set of models for quantifying the services provided by coastal and marine ecosystems. Silver's research interests include marine and estuarine microbial ecology and biogeochemistry. She has a Master's degree in microbial ecology from the University of Washington, and a B.A. in biology from Wellesley College.
Heather Tallis, Ph.D.
Lead Scientist
Heather Tallis is leading several projects to apply InVEST and environmental services in locations around the world. She is currently working with The Nature Conservancy on water funds in Colombia and Ecuador. She has explored resource management options with Penan communities in Borneo, villagers in Cambodia, timber and aquaculture industries in Washington (USA) and a hydropower company in New Zealand. Her academic research has focused on the biological consequences of nutrient and carbon flows in the open ocean, coastal zone, rivers and forests. Tallis received her Ph.D. from the University of Washington and has won awards from Rotary International, the Ford Foundation and the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, among others.
Barton H.(Buzz) Thompson Jr.
Director, Woods Institute for the Environment, Stanford University
Buzz Thompson is one of the Natural Capital Project’s principle experts in policy and finance, while also acting as a key liaison with The Woods Institute for the Environment at Stanford. A national expert in environmental and natural resources law and policy, he has contributed a large body of scholarship on environmental issues ranging from the future of endangered species and fisheries to the use of innovative economic strategies to support conservation. He is the founding director of Stanford University’s Law School’s Environmental and Natural Resources Program, the Robert E. Paradise Professor of Natural Resources Law, and a board member of the Nature Conservancy of California and the American Farmland Trust. Before joining the Stanford Law School faculty in 1986, Thompson was a partner at O’Melveny & Myers in Los Angeles, a lecturer at the University of California at Los Angeles School of Law, and a law clerk to the late Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist.
Jodie Toft, Ph.D.
Fisheries Ecologist
Jodie Toft is working on Marine InVEST, a set of models for quantifying the services provided by coastal and marine ecosystems. Toft's research interests include modeling of coastal and marine social-ecological-systems, fisheries bioeconomics, and ecosystem-based management. Toft received her Ph.D. from the School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences at the University of Washington and her B.A. in biology and public policy analysis from Pomona College.
Gregg Verutes
GIS Analyst, Marine Initiative
Gregg Verutes develops the marine InVEST tools, a set of models for quantifying the services provided by coastal and marine ecosystems. His work focuses primarily on the automation and application of these models in Vancouver Island BC, coastal Belize and various demonstration sites throughout the United States. He also has experience as a GIS instructor and cartographer having previously worked for National Geographic Magazine and the World Wildlife Fund's Conservation Science Program. Mr. Verutes received his M.S. from the Department of Geography at the San Diego State University and his B.S. in Policy Analysis and Management from Cornell University.
Stacie Wolny
GIS Analyst
Stacie Wolny develops and applies the terrestrial hydrology toolset for the Natural Capital Project and supports Stanford's Center for Conservation Biology. After twelve years working as a system administrator and software engineer in Silicon Valley, she started studying GIS as a way to combine her computer background with a love of natural history and ecology. Wolny received a B.S. in computer science from Penn State University and studied GIS at Foothill College and San Jose State University.
Spencer Wood, Ph.D.
Marine Ecologist
Spencer Wood works directly with partner organisations in Belize who are revising and evaluating the country's coastal management plan, using tools produced by the Natural Capital Project. His scientific research focuses on empirical and mathematical approaches to understanding interactions between humans and the environment in complex socio-ecological networks. This includes studies on patterns of tourism in Belize, ancient human settlement in the Aleutian Islands, and distributions of species interactions in New Zealand and British Columbia. Previously, Wood participated in a variety of ecological studies on intertidal biodiversity, nearshore wave transformation, coastal sedimentation, and fire recovery. He earned his PhD from the University of British Columbia and is currently based in Seattle, WA.
Guy Ziv, Ph.D.
Lead Scientific Development
Guy Ziv is leading the development of terrestrial and freshwater environmental services within InVEST. He is a physicist experienced in modeling natural and artificial complex systems. His past projects include analyzing trade-offs between hydropower dams construction and fish biodiversity and productivity in the Mekong River Basin, and quantifying bird communities resilience to agricultural intensification in Costa-Rica. His research interest is the interplay between policy, land management decisions and land use change impacts on Environmental Services. He holds a Ph.D. in Physics from the Weizmann Institute of Science, and was a Research Associate at Princeton University before joining the Natural Capital Project.