Robin Harder

Contact Details

Research Interests

Bio

Robin is an environmental systems scientist with a background in urban water management and a keen interest in farming and soil regeneration. He earned his BSc from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (Civil Engineering), MSc from Delft University of Technology (Sanitary Engineering), and PhD from Chalmers University of Technology (Chemical Environmental Science). He currently aims to apply and extend his knowledge to design nutrient recycling from human excreta to food production for long-term soil health.

Robin is employed as international postdoctoral researcher at Chalmers University of Technology through a mobility starting grant for young researchers from the Swedish Research Council Formas. At UBC, he is appointed as honorary postdoctoral fellow at IRES (Egesta Laboratory) and the Faculty of Land and Food Systems (Sustainable Agricultural Landscapes Laboratory).

Chalmers: https://www.chalmers.se/en/staff/Pages/robin-harder.aspx

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robinharder/
ResearchGate: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Robin_Harder

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Featured Publications

Madison Stevens

PhD with Dr. Terre Satterfield, 2023
Postdoctoral Research Scholar, Indigenous-Led Ecological Restoration, Boise State University

Contact Details

madison.stevens@ubc.alumni.ca

phone: 4065481582

https://www.linkedin.com/in/madison-stevens-616b7494/ https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Madison_Stevens2 https://pif.forestry.ubc.ca/people/madison-stevens/

Bio

At IRES, Madison Stevens was a PhD candidate and UBC Public Scholar at the Institute for Resources, Environment, and Sustainability at the University of British Columbia, under the supervision of Dr. Terre Satterfield. Her research interests focus on the nature of conservation decision-making, asking questions about how evidence and knowledges are applied to conservation problems, who makes decisions, and how conservation models account for human rights. For her dissertation research, she employed mixed social science methods and a political ecology lens to understand the governance and stewardship dimensions of community forests in Uttarakhand, India. She was also involved in projects focused on the equity dimensions of climate adaptation and the use of evidence in conservation planning in Canada. In 2021 Madison acted as a Climate Expert for the Climate Teaching Connector program at UBC, and a Project Assistant for the Canadian Mountain Assessment project. She holds a BA in Comparative Literary and Cultural Studies from Franklin University, Switzerland, in 2015, where her thesis highlighted Indigenous land rights and conflict in Uganda. Her professional background includes a decade of experience working for conservation nonprofit organizations, notably as an Education Media Specialist and Logistics Coordinator with Polar Bears International since 2011. When not working, she likes to spend her days playing outside, immersed in appreciation for the wilder places.

Last Updated May 2023

Featured Publications

Stevens, M, & Norris, R. (2022). A mixed methodology for evaluating use of evidence in conservation planning. Conservation Biology. https://doi.org/10.1111/cobi.13876

Stevens, M, & Ramesh, K. (In press). ‘If there is jangal, there is everything’: exercising stewardship rights and responsibilities in van panchayat community forests, Johar Valley, Uttarakhand, India. In J. Bulkan, J. Palmer, M. Hobley, & A. M. Larson (Eds.), Handbook on Community Forestry. Routledge. https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/edit/10.4324/9780367488710/routledge-handbook-community-forestry-janette-bulkan-john-palmer-mary-hobley-anne-larson

Adler, C, Wester, P, Bhatt, I […] Stevens, M (Contributing Author). (2022). Cross-Chapter Paper 5: Mountains. Second Order Draft. IPCC WGII (Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability) Sixth Assessment Report. https://www.ipcc.ch/report/sixth-assessment-report-working-group-ii/

McDowell, G, Stevens, M, Lesnikowski, A, Huggel, C, Harden, A, DiBella, J, Morecroft, M, Kumar, P, Joe, ET, Bhatt, I. (2021). Closing the adaptation gap in mountains. Mountain Research and Development 41(3) A1-A10. https://doi.org/10.1659/MRD-JOURNAL-D-21-00033.1

Rustam Sengupta

Adjunct Professor

Contact Details

Research Interests

Bio

Rustam Sengupta is a renewable energy entrepreneur, impact investor and subject matter expert with extensive research experience of over a decade in sustainable social enterprise design, rooftop solar and renewable energy access. He has an expertise in identifying, designing and analysing strategies that affect energy systems and policies with a geographical focus on South Asia. He is the author of the book ‘De-Mystifying Impact Investing an Entrepreneurs’ Guide, which provides strategic, advises and recommendations on impact investment and has served as a guide for several emerging entrepreneurs and investors.

Rustam is also the founder and Chairman of Boond (www.boond.net), an energy access enterprise that creates rural entrepreneurs and distribution channels for development products like solar rooftops and solar micro grids in remote parts of India. He was selected as one of the top 36 entrepreneurs who accompanied the Indian Prime Minister Mr. Narendra Modi as a part of his Start up India delegation to the US in 2015. In addition to his role in impact investment advisory and deal structuring to start-ups, he has had wide experience in private banking and strategic consulting and has worked in agencies like Standard Chartered (in Singapore), Syngenta (in Switzerland) and Deloitte Consulting (in the US). He is the board member and investor of Emsys Electronics (P) Ltd (a company that designs and manufactures high quality electronic products), Mynergy Solar (P) Ltd., (a company that specializes in leasing and asset management company for solar rooftop projects) and WithIndia (P) Ltd (a company that manufacturers environmentally friendly, insect and fire proof panels and tiles. Rustam also holds the position of Associate Director at the John Hopkin’s University Institute of Sustainable Energy Policy (ISEP) where is charged with finding and implementing projects related to market-led solutions to sustainable energy policy. He is also the lead founding partner of Boond Energy Expert Group (BEEG) that works with governments, policy makers and bilateral institutions on energy storage, smart grids, distributed rooftop solar and electric transportation.

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Paige Olmsted

Adjunct Professor

Contact Details

Research Interests

Bio

Paige is an environmental scientist whose research focuses on how we account for, make decisions about, and value nature – from a personal as well as economic standpoint. She is currently based at the Smart Prosperity Institute, a policy think tank based in Ottawa. There she leads their conservation finance initiative, examining financial mechanisms and enabling conditions to catalyze interest and investment to support ecosystem services and the natural environment. Her expertise centers around ecosystem services, nature-based solutions for climate change, ecological economics, and environmental and relational values. With a common thread of connecting people and nature, her work has spanned rural agricultural settings in Latin America and South East Asia, to advocating for change in international policy settings, to providing sustainability guidance to private sector actors. In this work and past positions at the Earth Institute in New York City and UNEP in Geneva, she enjoys working with a range of stakeholders to address conservation challenges — including local communities, NGOs, various scales of government, academia, and the private sector. Paige maintains affiliations with the CHANS (Connecting Human and Natural Systems) Lab at IRES, and the Copenhagen Business School as part of the Impact for Innovation Lab. She holds a PhD from the Institute of Resources, Environment and Sustainability at UBC and a Master’s of Environmental Science and Policy from Columbia University.

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Nadja Kunz

Assistant Professor, Norman B. Keevil Institute of Mining Engineering
Assistant Professor, School of Public Policy and Global Affairs

Bio

Nadja Kunz is appointed at SPPGA and Mining Engineering, not at IRES, and instead is a Faculty Associate of our unit. She may supervise students in our RES graduate program.

http://mining.ubc.ca/person/nadja-kunz/

https://sppga.ubc.ca/profile/nadja-kunz/

Our Faculty Associates play a special role in IRES, compared to many other units. A large percentage of the graduate student population (of over 100 students) in IRES are supervised by advisors from other departments, hence Faculty Associates are crucial for the role they play in supervising the interdisciplinary graduate students in our institute.

IRES Faculty Associates do not have voting rights and are nominated and seconded by an IRES faculty member. Becoming a Faculty Associate also requires the agreement of the Dean and the home department head, and is generally based on previous involvement with our institute. To learn more about how to become an IRES Faculty Associate, please click here.

Erika Gavenus

PhD with Terre Satterfield, 2024

International Doctoral Fellow, O’Riordan Fellow

Research Interests

Cultural ecosystem services, Environmental and cultural values, First Nations and Resource Management, Food security, Political ecology

Bio

Erika Gavenus was a PhD student at the Institute for Resources, Environment and Sustainability under the supervision of Dr. Terre Satterfield. Erika holds an Master’s degree in Environmental Health Sciences from the University of California, Berkeley and a Bachelor’s degree in Global Health from Georgetown University. During her Master’s work, Erika completed research with communities along the Kenyan coast of Lake Victoria considering how changes to local fisheries related to food security and child nutrition.

During her studies at UBC, Erika was looking to expand on this research background to consider the mechanisms through which coastal communities access natural resources, and how changes to access might affect human health, with particular attention to social and cultural aspects of community health.

Erika’s interest in this research area is inspired by growing up and working in a fishing community in Alaska, and by the common understanding and relationships she has found among fishermen throughout her research.

Stephen Chignell

PhD with Mark Johnson & Terre Satterfield, 2024
International Doctoral Fellow, R. Howard Webster Fellow, Vanier Scholar

Contact Details

steve dot chignell at ubc dot ca

https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=dUVhfswAAAAJ&hl=en

Research Interests

Biodiversity conservation, Community-based research, Connectivity science, Data science, Environmental and cultural values, Environmental justice, Geosciences, Political ecology, Resource governance and management, Science-policy interface, Social ecological systems, Social Network Analysis

Bio

I am interested in both the physical and social aspects of environmental and sustainability issues, and enjoy finding creative ways to understand their intersection. Prior to UBC, I completed a M.S. in Watershed Science at Colorado State University, where I studied relationships among water development, land change, and urban growth in Ethiopia. I also contributed geospatial analyses to the IPBES Global Assessment and was involved in a series of participatory mapping projects with the Secondary Cities Initiative. Most recently, I worked to reconstruct the history of Antarctic science with the McMurdo Dry Valleys Long-Term Ecological Research project.

Cameron Bullen

MSc Student, Ocean Leader Fellow

Contact Details

Research Interests

Bio

Cameron joined IRES in 2018 as a MSc student supervised by Dr. Kai Chan. Cameron is broadly interested in marine conservation, marine ecology, and changing ecosystem dynamics in the context of ecosystem function and contribution to people.

Before beginning at IRES, Cameron worked on Marine Protected Areas in Canada with CPAWS-BC, conducted research on plankton adaptation to changing environments with Dr. Michelle Tseng, and worked as an environmental biologist with Azimuth Consulting Group. Cameron grew up in Vancouver and enjoys spending as much time outside as possible: running, climbing, and paddling.

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Featured Publications

Luis Felipe Melgarejo

M.A. Student at IRES

Contact Details

melgfelip@gmail.com

Research Interests

Biodiversity conservation, Climate change, Corporate social responsibility, Food security, Management of biodiversity, Resource governance and management, Social ecological systems

Bio

M.A. student at the Institute for Resources Environment and Sustainability IRES UBC (2018-2020) interested in Biodiversity and Ecosystem-based Entrepreneurships and value chains aimed at conserving and sustainably managing tropical forests with rural communities. Former Amazon Regional Coordinator in the Forest and Climate Protection Program /REDD+ GIZ and Climate Policy Advisor to the FCO British Embassy in Colombia (2014-2018). Humboldt Climate Protection Fellow and Alumni at the Geomatics Lab Universitaet Humboldt zu Berlin and VRA at the Environmental Change Institute – Oxford University (2011-2013). Regional development planning researcher (M.Sc. UP Diliman Philippines and TU Dortmund Germany) and consultant in environmental and social conflict transformation (2003-2011).

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Featured Publications

Seminars / Colloquiums

(2005) International Colloquium on Regional Development Planning (SPRING, Technische Universität Dortmund). Integrated Rural Development Planning in Conflict Affected Areas: The experience of Pikit, Mindanao (Philippines).

(2007) International Congress on Urban Development Planning and Conflict Management. SPRING TU Dortmund and University of Jakarta. Urban Planning and Peace-building in the suburbs of Medellín, Colombia.

(2009) International Cooperation Graduate Studies – Universidad Externado de Colombia, Faculty of Finances and International Relations. Lecture on German Technical Cooperation and German Development Cooperation Project Management Schemes.

(2010) ObservaTICS/Universidad Externado de Colombia – Universidad Francisco de Paula Santander (Joint Programme).Prospective Planning and ICTs/e-Government Solutions.

(2013) Annual International Conference of the Royal Geographical Society of London. Research Group on Climate Hazards and Adaptation. Bearing the Unbearable: the use of public infrastructure to provide transitional shelter during erratic rainfalls and river-floods in Colombia.

Peña B. Luis Carlos, Melgarejo L.F, et al. (2016) Orientaciones para reducción de la deforestación y degradación de los bosques: Ejemplo de utilización de estudios de motores de deforestación en la planeación territorial para la Amazonía Colombiana. Bogotá. https://www.sinchi.org.co/orientaciones-para-reduccion-de-la-deforestacion-y-degradacion-de-los-bosques

Melgarejo, L.F., Lakes, Tobia (2013) Urban adaptation planning and climate-related disasters: an integrative assessment of infrastructure serving as temporary shelter during river floods in Colombia. International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction IJDRR. London. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2212420914000417.

Melgarejo, L.F. (2007) Guía para incorporar los Objetivos de Desarrollo del Milenio en Planes de Desarrollo Municipal. Bogotá. GTZ Programa PRODESPAZ.

Ospina, A. y Melgarejo, L.F. (2009) Caja de Herramientas para incorporar los Objetivos del Milenio en Planes de Responsabilidad Social Empresarial: Experiencia de Boyacá Responsable. Bogotá. GTZ Programa CERCAPAZ.

Rottman, Helen y Melgarejo, L.F. (2009) Herramientas para el manejo alternativo de Conflictos entre Ciudadanía, Alcaldías y Gobernaciones. Bogotá. GTZ Programa CERCAPAZ.

Several Authors (Melgarejo, L.F.) 2010 Metodologías para facilitar procesos de constitución de Territorios Socialmente Responsables. Bogotá. GTZ Programa CERCAPAZ.

Melgarejo, L.F. (2005) Information and Communications Technologies in Integrated Rural Development Projects of Conflict Affected Areas of Pikit, Philippines: Measurement Techniques of Social Entropy. UP Diliman SURP. Manila.

Victor Lam

MA Student

Contact Details

victorwaiyinlam@gmail.com

Research Interests

Bio

Victor is broadly interested in cultural and social-behavioural dimensions of climate change. Specifically, he has been focusing on the interaction between climate change communication, climate movements, and religious environmentalism. His current thesis focuses on how religious publics articulate and disseminate messages on climate change, by examining how religious environmental organizations frame climate change in their participation of the resistance movements on the Trans-Mountain Pipeline Expansion and Dakota Access Pipeline projects. Particular vernaculars and modes of communication, such as the use of religious language and metaphors, as well as the emerging use of social media, have emerged as important instruments for bridging climate change understanding among such audiences.

Victor completed his BASc in Sustainability, Science and Society at McGill University. Prior to beginning his current studies at UBC, he worked in Hong Kong for three years in the field of energy policy and governance on the Asia-Pacific region in the Department of Geography and Asian Energy Energy Studies Centre at Hong Kong Baptist University.

Victor enjoys a variety of outdoor activities, including hiking, swimming, running, and gardening.