Caldeira Lab

Nienke Besbrugge (Research Scientist)

Danny Cullenward (Research Associate)

Danny Cullenward is an energy economist and lawyer working on the design and implementation of scientifically grounded climate policy. He is the Policy Director at Near Zero and a Research Associate with the Carnegie Institution for Science; he also teaches courses on energy and climate law at Stanford Law School. In 2017, Danny was appointed by the California Senate to the Independent Emissions Market Advisory Committee, which is charged with reviewing California's cap-and-trade program. Danny serves on the Berkeley Energy & Resources Collaborative (BERC) advisory board and previously taught climate policy as the inaugural Philomathia Research Fellow at UC Berkeley. In addition to his administrative law practice, he has represented environmental scientists as amici in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and U.S. Supreme Court. Danny holds a JD from Stanford Law School and a PhD in Environment and Resources (E-IPER) from Stanford University, where he earned his MS in Management Science & Engineering and a BS with Honors in Earth Systems. 

David Farnham (Postdoctoral Fellow)

David Farnham is an environmental engineer and hydroclimatologist interested in how climate affects our engineered water and energy systems. David’s work can broadly be described as the development of statistical models to estimate and/or predict climate risks at time scales ranging from daily to seasonal to multi-decadal.

With regard to water systems, David has authored papers on topics ranging from the prediction of urban water contamination, to the estimation of future regional riverine flooding hazard, to the climate drivers of seasonal precipitation variability in water scarce regions such as the Southwestern, United States.

Within energy systems, David has been focusing on weather/climate dependent renewable energy technologies; namely solar, wind, and hydro power. For example, David has recently been investigating the implications of yearly to decadal fluctuations in potential wind and solar energy supply for energy system planning.

Candise Henry (Postdoctoral Fellow)

Candise Henry is a researcher with a background in geology and geomorphology. Her previous work has examined the influence of externally- versus internally-driven geological processes on sediment deposition and basin architecture at passive margins for use in oil and gas exploration. She also has an interest in energy systems, and has published research looking at the impacts of climate change on thermoelectric power production in the U.S. She will join the Caldeira Lab at the Carnegie Institution in January of 2019 to research efforts towards near-zero emissions energy systems.

Michael Mastrandrea (Director, Near Zero Project)

Michael Mastrandrea is the Director of Near Zero, which provides credible, impartial, and actionable climate and energy research and policy analysis. Previously, he helped lead development of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Fifth Assessment Report, a global assessment of climate change science and policy options. His work has focused on strategies for reducing climate risks and integrating expert knowledge and quantitative analysis to inform public and private decisions from global to local scales. He has taught at Stanford University as a Lecturer and Assistant Consulting Professor, and received his PhD from Stanford’s Emmett Interdisciplinary Program in Environment and Resources.

Geeta Persad (Research Associate)

Geeta G. Persad is a Research Associate in the Caldeira Lab at the Carnegie Institution for Science's Department of Global Ecology, where she studies the impacts of short-lived climate pollutants on regional and global climate using numerical models. She serves as acting Principle Investigator on Carnegie's multi-year National Science Foundation-funded collaboration with the University of California San Diego and Stanford University to assess the coupled climate and institutional dynamics of short-lived local pollutants and long-lived global greenhouse gases.

Dr. Persad also serves as Senior Climate Scientist in the Union of Concerned Scientists Western States Office where she leads technical analysis on their short-lived climate pollutant and water resources portfolios.

Dr. Persad received her PhD in Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences and a certificate in Science, Technology and Environmental Policy from Princeton University, where she was a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow and a Ford Policy Fellow. Prior to her PhD, Dr. Persad served as a Physical Scientist in the United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. She holds a B.S. in Geophysics from Stanford University.

Tyler Ruggles (Research Scientist)

Leslie Willoughby (Science Writer)

Leslie's first love was a horned toad that lived in her backyard in Albuquerque. It disappeared over winter, emerged in spring, and showed her that nature changes over time. Throughout childhood, she yearned to share that lizard's world with others.

In college she studied environmental interpretation. Afterward, at the newly created Ohio EPA, she funded programs that regulated scrubbers in coal-fired power plants and improved sewage treatment facilities. Later, as a science teacher, she set the lab tables with a new narrative each morning. Monday’s tale might compare skeletons; Tuesday’s could mimic a lunar eclipse.

When climate change became the biggest nature story, Leslie signed on as a reporter in the Eastern Sierra. While forest fires rage and drought starves California's snowpack and water supply, Leslie heeds the call for epic writing muscle. She works out every day.