Valerie Cleland

MA, Marine and Environmental Affairs, 2016 IPI Fellow
Valerie Cleland

About

With a B.S. in Environmental Science and International Relations from Tufts University, Valerie’s interest has always been at the intersection of science and policy. While working in environmental consulting before coming to graduate school at the School of Marine and Environmental Affairs, Valerie had the chance to work on the environmental aspects of ICEX2016. ICEX is a Navy and UW Applied Physics Lab (APL) temporary camp on the Arctic sea ice. Through this project, she was exposed to the large number of unknowns in the far north in both the science and environmental policy. She began to see the Arctic as the place where environmental policy that includes the indigenous communities could be done right. She’s interested in the resilience of local communities and ecosystems when faced with an environmental disasters, be it an oil spill or otherwise, and how the Arctic countries can work together to mitigate and respond to such risks.

Research interests: Short and long term emergency response in the Arctic, particularly cross-boundary oil spills and their effects on local ecosystems, indigenous communities, and larger Arctic environmental policy.


Latest Valerie Cleland News