Dr Katy Roelich is jointly appointed between the School of Earth and Environment and the School of Civil Engineering at the University of Leeds (UoL). She is Co-Director of the Sustainability Research Institute and member of the Management Committee of the Priestley International Centre for Climate.
Dr Roelich’s research is centred around adaptive and participatory decision making. She currently holds an EPSRC Challenge Fellowship examining how we can make better decisions to transform infrastructure systems, taking into account deep physical and social uncertainties and, crucially, the fact that multiple actors must make decisions and interact to deliver system transformation.
She joined UoL from the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI), where she worked in the field of sustainable consumption and production and led the Rethinking Development Theme. Prior to joining academia in 2010, she had nine years’ experience in environmental and engineering consulting in the UK and overseas. She provided environmental and sustainability advice on issues ranging from waste management to climate change mitigation for the private sector, government agencies, and utility companies.
Dr Roelich’s research interests include decision making under deep uncertainty, particularly adaptive and dynamic decision making where multiple actors are involved in transforming systems; delivering sustainable infrastructure services with lower resource input; public perceptions of sustainable transitions; and democracy and social justice in sustainable transitions.