Our Team

Expertise: Energy, poverty and development

Jiska is an energy and development geographer based at the University of Cape Town’s African Climate and Development Initiative. She holds a PhD in Human Geography focused on renewable energy and stakeholder engagement, an MSc in International Development Studies and a MA in Cultural Anthropology. In her current position as Senior Researcher at the University of Cape Town, her work focuses on the human dimension of sustainable energy access, energy poverty, gender and capacity building. She has a strong interest in conducting research that is policy-and practice-relevant with a focus on achieving local development benefits, whilst assisting with local change processes. Jiska currently leads the research support programme of the FCDO-funded Transforming Energy Access Programme, the establishment of a network of southern expertise for the energy access sector and provides Gender and social inclusion support to a range of international energy and climate change programmes.

Email: jiske.degroot@uct.ac.za

Dr Petra Holden is a transdisciplinary conservation scientist specialises in research on nature-based solutions. Crossing natural and social sciences, her work intersects social equity, water security, ecosystem services, biodiversity, and climate change. Her past research includes attributing the impacts of climate change on water security and quantifying how well nature-based solutions can offset anthropogenic climate change impacts. Currently, her focus is on research to inform nature-based solutions that are more equitable and sustainable at local levels while accounting for changes in the climate. In 2023, Petra’s work on nature-based solutions was recognised on an international stage through receiving the Frontiers Planet Prize, which awards research that contributes towards solutions to planetary environmental challenges. Petra also provides nature-based solution science advisory support to policy and practice. This includes serving on an international global advisory panel for gender inclusive nature-based solutions and as an advisor to the South African National Biodiversity Institute for supporting the access of international climate finance for nature-based solution projects and programmes.

For more information on Petra’s research see Google Scholar,  ORCID and the TES NbS project.

Email: petra.holden@uct.ac.za

Glynis is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the African Climate Development Institute (ACDI) in the TES NbS project. Her current research project is centered on understanding the socio-economic benefits and constraints of Nature-Based Solutions in achieving social equity in southern Africa. Glynis core interests are in people (indigenous knowledge), biodiversity, climate, fire, ecosystem services, and the use of trans and inter-disciplinary research to address adaptive management and conservation policies.

Glynis’s postdoctoral project at the Plant Conservation Unit (UCT) involved investigating woody cover change in relation to climate, fire, and land use history in north-east Namibia using remote sensing, GIS and repeat photographs. Her PhD (2018) research focussed on the use inter-disciplinary methods to investigate the spatial and temporal fire regime patterns and knowledge exchange between rural livelihood sustainability and governance to address fire management policy in Namibia.

Between her studies, Glynis worked in the field in South Africa, Peru, Botswana, Namibia, Tanzania, and Madagascar. Professional experiences include work as a conservation ecologist in Botswana, field guiding, wild-life research and monitoring in South Africa, environmental consulting specializing in arid-zone ecological restoration and environmental assessments in Namibia, and community-based integrated fire management project in South Africa and Tanzania. Glynis has a PhD (Plant Conservation Unit, UCT), and MSc in Conservation biology (Fitzpatrick Institute of African Ornithology, University of Cape Town), and a BSc. (Hons) in Environmental Science (Rhodes University).

Email: glynis.humphrey@uct.ac.za ORCID

Tawanda Jimu joined the ACDI as a post-doctoral researcher. His work is part of the UCT Khusela Ikamva sustainable campus project. Tawanda’s research focusses on sustainability transitions and management, human dimensions of small-scale fisheries in both inland and coastal contexts. His previous work has been interdisciplinary in nature and it covered concepts and insights from regional fish trade, sustainable management of natural resources, integrated resource governance, fisheries resources conflicts, and the links between poverty, inequality, land and agrarian studies.

Tawanda holds a PhD in Geography and Environmental Studies (Stellenbosch), MPhil in Poverty, Land and Agrarian studies (PLAAS, University of the Western Cape), Development Studies (UNISA) and Bachelor’s degree (UZ). He is also a SAP Certified Application Associate in Financial Accounting. Prior to joining ACDI he worked on a WorldFish Africa fish trade project, and other regional and international programs.

In his role at the ACDI, Kagiso Keatimilwe is responsible for maintaining relationships with partners, identifying funding opportunities and leading the development of large research proposals. He has previously worked in the Botswana public service, United Nations Development Programme, as well as the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) where he gained knowledge of environmental issues, experience in design and implementation of environmental projects, as well as building and maintaining collaborative research relationships. He has also been involved in civic activities in Botswana, particularly in education and culture. Kagiso holds an Honours degree in Town Planning as well as a Masters degree in Natural Resources Planning.

Email: kagiso.keatimilwe@uct.ac.za

Nadine Methner is a Research Fellow at the ACDI. Nadine’s research interests focus on: strengthening the evidence base for ecosystem based adaptation in relation to climate risks and livelihoods resilience; analysis and advancement of the Water-Energy-Food-Biodiversity-Land Nexus in the context of sustainable livelihoods; identifying processes and patterns of interactions in complex governance systems; strengthening the adaptive capacity of local and regional organizations through joined knowledge integration, collective learning and collaboration; integrative systems thinking and cross-scale analyses; and democratisation of scientific knowledge and policy decision making processes.

Nadine is particularly interested in engaging in and advancing of transdisciplinary research aimed at societal transformation in the context of climate change and persistent levels of inequality. 

Tel: +27(0)21 650 2915 · Email: nadine.methner@uct.ac.za

Expertise: Biodiversity, Climate Change, Global Change Biology, Macroecology

Andreas is a biodiversity scientist whose research focuses on understanding the impacts of climate change on species, ecosystems, and people. He employs computational tools to predict when and where climate risks to biodiversity and people will emerge, and uses this information to support informed decision-making and adaptive management for both nature and people. His work also involves exploring the potential risks to biodiversity from emerging approaches such as carbon dioxide removal and solar radiation modification. Andreas is also interested in understanding how climate mobility and biodiversity conservation will interact in Africa, and how adaptive management strategies can address the challenges posed by this interaction. Other research interests include macroecology and evolutionary biology.Andreas holds a PhD in Zoology from Universidade Federal do Paraná, Brazil, with a stay at the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Arizona, USA.

Email: andreas.meyer@uct.ac.za

Assumpta is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the TES NbS (Towards Equitable and Sustainable Nature-based Solutions in Southern Africa’s Water Towers) project. She is working on processed-based biogeochemical, land surface and/or hydrological modelling. Specifically modelling nature-based solutions for trade-offs and long-term resilience.

She has a background in Mathematics and the mathematical modelling of ecological systems. She completed her PhD at Stellenbosch University, where she researched the complexity and stability of mutualistic local and meta-networks. Also, she completed her MSc at Stellenbosch University and focused on the structural emergence in pollination networks of Galápagos Islands. Before then, she attended the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences, South Africa, where she obtained a Masters degree in Mathematical Sciences. She obtained her B.Sc (Hons) in Mathematics from the University of Ilorin.

In December 2020, she was awarded `Outstanding Community Women Leader / Role Model' by Nigerian Citizens Association South Africa (NICASA) Western Cape Chapter. Also in 2019, she received the Nigeria Community Excellence Award `Outstanding Nigerian Female Achievement in South Africa' by the Nigerian Voice Newspaper South Africa.

Email: assumpta.onyeagoziri@uct.ac.za

Romaric, through his research, aims to enhance human development outcomes in the context of climate change. His research interest is around assessing changes in regional climate risks arising from human influence on the climate in Africa. He focuses on quantifying changes in the risk of weather and climate extremes in Africa using the attribution science concept and climate modelling. His current research involves assessing the influence of human-induced warming on climate/weather parameters used in insurance risk modelling and the cost of insurance. His focus is primarily on agricultural insurance in Africa. Other research interests of his include improving knowledge on the possible impact of solar geoengineering on the future climate in Africa.

He completed a PhD in Meteorology and Climate Science in 2016 and has a strong background in Agricultural Sciences. For his PhD research, he used climate models to examine the potential impacts of large-scale forestation on climate extremes over West Africa.

Tel: +27 (0)21 650 2909       Email: romaric.odoulami@uct.ac.za         ORCID        Google Scholar

Expertise: Climate policy, energy policy, sustainable development, energy transitions, political economy, science and technology studies, innovation policy

Britta's research focuses on climate policy and technology in developing countries and the links between poverty, inequality, energy and mitigation of climate change. In her previous work she analysed renewable energy and nuclear programmes, carbon taxation, green industrial and innovation policies. Britta has published various papers and book chapters on the overall question on integrating policies on emissions reductions, energy supply and development in Africa and Latin America. 

Britta Rennkamp holds a PhD in Political Science, and a Diplom/MSc in Regional Sciences – Political Sciences, Economics, Latin American History, Spanish and Portuguese language and literature. She has ten years of international work experience in sustainable development research, consulting and teaching, which she acquired in Brazil, Germany and South Africa. Read more.

Email: britta.rennkamp@uct.ac.za

Dorcas Stella Shumba is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at ACDI and Carnegie Fellow under the Developing Emerging Academic Leaders (DEAL) Fellowship Program. Her research assesses the recent advances in, and challenges for, weather index insurance in managing climate change risk among smallholder farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa. She collaborates with Professor Mark New, who is the Primary Investigator. Her research interests overall include climate change and farming, climate change adaptation, climate finance, and the nexus between risk, resilience and sustainable development. She is involved in climate advocacy as a Green Ambassador for Climate Change in Africa. To improve her capacity for effective participation and involvement in national, regional and global climate change policy processes and decision making, she recently completed a Climate Leadership and Diplomacy Course offered by the African Group of Negotiators Experts Support Centre (AGNES) and will soon be taking part in a Science Diplomacy Course offered by The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and The World Academy of Sciences (TWAS). In her advisory roles, Stella serves as an Advisory Board Member (Environment & Corporate Social Responsibility) for the Zimbabwe Iron and Steel Company (ZISCO Steel), and Climate Change Consultant contributing towards the drafting of a World Bank sponsored Climate Change Public Expenditure and Institutional Review (CPEIR) for Zimbabwe. Before taking up the Carnegie Fellowship, Stella was a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Development Studies at the Women’s University of Africa in Zimbabwe. She holds a PhD in Development Studies from Massey University in New Zealand.

Darlington is part of a team of researchers from University of Cape Town and Arizona State University (USA) who are currently working on a research project titled Accelerating Climate Adaptation via Meso-Level Integration (ACAMI) funded by Gates Foundation. The project seeks to analyse the role played by intermediary organisations in climate change adaptation with a special focus on small scale producers in Ghana, Kenya, Malawi and South Africa. He is also part of a team a team of researchers in the process of completing a UKRI-funded project titled Transforming Social Inequalities Through Inclusive Climate Action (TSITICA). . He is a Co-Chair of Adaptation Network (AN)of South Africa’s Policy and Climate Finance Committee. Darlington also remains an active member Alumni of the Africa Centres of Excellence funded by DAAD. Previously, he worked at the Institute for Poverty Land & Agrarian Studies (PLAAS) on Water Research Commission-funded Projects. Darlington has a PHD in Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies from the University of the Western Cape. Darlington also worked for the Western Cape Education Department and Ministry of Education (Zimbabwe).

Email: darlington.sibanda@uct.ac.za

Designation: Senior Researcher
Expertise: Climate change, climate change mitigation, youth, training, capacity building

Debbie Sparks is a Senior Researcher at ACDI and has more than 20 years of experience working in the broad climate change arena. Her current research interests are on climate change and youth. Her expertise and strengths include research in the fields of energy and climate change, capacity building, curriculum design, teaching and training. Debbie has co-convened the ACDI Masters' module on Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation since its inception. She delivers training and assistance to developing countries under the UNFCCC's Technology Needs Assessment project. Debbie holds a MSc and PhD in Environmental and Geographical Science from the University of Cape Town.

Email: debbie.sparks@uct.ac.za    |   Google Scholar

Joyce Kimutai joined ACDI as a Masters research student in July 2018 as part of the AXA Research Chair Programme in African Climate Risk. She is now pursuing her PhD at the ACDI. Joyce Kimutai is a Climate Scientist affiliated with Kenya Meteorological Services and the Grantham Institute of Climate Change. Her research has increasingly focused on analysing the role of anthropogenic climate change in extreme weather/climate events and raising climate risk awareness among decision-makers in East Africa. She is currently the alternate IPCC Focal point for Kenya and negotiates for Kenya on agenda items under Science, Review and Systematic observations, Global Stocktake, and loss & damage at UNFCCC COP sessions. She participated as one of the Lead authors for the IPCC Special Report on Climate Change and Land in the Sixth Assessment Cycle (AR6).

Tiro joined ACDI in July 2018 as a PhD student after being awarded the Doctorate Scholarship in the Attribution of Impacts of Climatic Extremes in Southern Africa under the AXA Research Chair Programme in African Climate Risk. He is working with a team of researchers from the University of Cape Town and University of Oxford that looks to locate the fingerprint of anthropogenic climate change on weather and climate extremes in agricultural and hydrological systems in Southern Africa. Tiro’s research focuses on impact attribution on agricultural and hydrological systems in Southern Africa. Tiro completed his MSc Climate Change and Development in 2018 from UCT’s Department of Environmental and Geographical Sciences under the ACDI’s ASSAR scholarship. He holds a BSc (Hons) Meteorology degree from the University of Reading (UK). He has worked as an Associate Researcher in the Climate Change Division at the Botswana Institute for Technology Research and Innovation (BITRI) and as a Meteorologist with the Botswana Meteorological Services.

Lavinia is a PhD candidate working on assessing the ways in which future infrastructure developments will change natural ecosystems across SSA. Lavinia completed her BSc undergraduate and Honours degree at the University of KwaZulu-Natal’s Environmental Science and Geography department. In 2014 Lavinia moved to Rhodes University in Grahamstown to complete her master’s degree at the Botany department. Besides her PhD, Lavinia has several roles and spaces within which she works. She works with several transdisciplinary organizations and teams as a project coordinator and facilitator. Lavinia is also a Design Thinking coach helping people turn their ideas into actions. She’s interested in using her skills to teach, learn and turn information into valuable knowledge that can address some of the challenges facing society.

Supervisors: Chris Jack, Anna Taylor, Juliet Hermes

Tania Duba is a PhD candidate working on investigating the influence of a participatory scenario planning process on climate risk perceptions in the small-scale fisheries sector. With a strong academic background in oceanography and a keen interest in unravelling the complexities of climate change, climate extremes, climate impact, and climate adaptation, she is committed to making meaningful contributions to the coastal climate science field and small-scale fisheries livelihood. Tania completed her MSc in environmental and geographical science in 2019 and holds a BSC (Hons) in oceanography from UCT. Alongside her PhD, Tania contributes in her affiliated institutions such as CSAG and SAEON as a research assistant and public engagement facilitator.

Rebeca holds a master’s degree (MSc) in African Politics from SOAS, University of London and a bachelor’s degree (BA with honours) in Politics and International Relations from Royal Holloway, University of London. Her masters’ dissertation is a political analysis of the DR Congo’s Electoral Glissement and Presidential Term Limits.

Before joining ACDI, she worked as a Guest researcher at the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI) in Sweden on the ongoing project Enhancing trust in government for effective water governance (EnTruGo) – jointly coordinated by SEI HQ, African Climate and Development Initiative (ACDI), Wageningen University (WUR) and The Arctic University of Norway (UiT). The objective of her study was to examine how participatory processes in water governance affect Indigenous and marginalised groups and how, in turn, these affect their relationship with the state.

In 2019 she worked as an intern and researcher at the African Climate and Development Initiative (ACDI) in South Africa. She was part of the IFAD multi-country climate risk analysis investigating the effects of national policies and plans on climate sensitive sectors in Angola, Botswana, Mozambique, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Rwanda, Uganda, eSwatini and Lesotho. During her studies, she worked as a human rights researcher at Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (CHRI) in London, United Kingdom.

Expertise: Climate change education, climate change graduate pathways, climate change vulnerability & adaptation, sustainable development, project coordination and development

Leigh is an independent researcher and facilitator associated with ACDI. She holds an MSc in Environmental Science. Leigh's work includes supporting new curriculum development, helping to conceptualise and develop new programs, and building ACDI’s understanding of best practice in climate change education in Africa and the global South through research.

She has worked on or developed over a dozen projects in these areas, including a scientific capacity development study to inform capacity development in the Future Climate for Africa (FCFA) project, and the development of an innovative Masters curriculum in Climate Change and Sustainable Development for Southern Africa. In the ARUA-CD, Leigh has worked with the Curriculum Working Group.

Tel: +27 (0)21 650 3846 · Email: leigh.cobban@uct.ac.za

Kamoru obtained his PhD in Atmospheric Science (with a specialisation in Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP), Seasonal Climate Prediction and Regional Climate Modeling) at the Department of Environmental and Geographical Sciences, at the University of Cape Town. His PhD thesis used discrepancy in a large ensemble of climate simulations as a tool to investigate variability in dominant seasonal rainfall and temperature patterns (i.e. classes) over West and Southern Africa, to examine the capability of climate models in reproducing the variability, and to study the limits of predictability of the seasonal climates over South Africa.

Kamoru also studied meteorology (B. Tech and M. Tech) at the Federal University of Technology, Akure, Nigeria, and has worked as an Aeronautical Meteorologist, Research Officer, and briefly as the Head of the Research and Training Directorate of the Nigerian Meteorological Agency. He has taught various meteorological courses at the Regional Meteorological Training Centre (RMTC), an affiliate of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), situated in Lagos.

Skillful and competent in computer programming languages and scripting in UNIX, Kamoru's passion is to impart knowledge to younger generations. He is presently investigating the interactions between teleconnection patterns and fire, as well as carrying out the performance evaluations of weather@home 2 models (HadAM3P and HadRm3P) over West African sub-region.

Tel: +27 (0)21 650 2909 · Email: kamoru.lawal@alumni.uct.ac.za

Megan Lukas-Sithole joined the ACDI in July 2019 as the Chapter Scientist for Chapter 17 (Decision-Making Options for Managing Risk) of the IPCC’s 6^th Assessment Report. For her PhD, she did an ethnographic study on the everyday sustainability practices of people living in Nyanga, Cape Town. Prior to her PhD, Megan worked at the City of Cape Town in the field of Environmental Management. Her qualifications include a BSc in Environmental and Geographical Science (UCT), PG Dip in Environmental Law (UCT), and MPhil in Environmental Management (Stellenbosch University).

Email: Megan.lukas@gmail.com

Kelvin Mulungu joined the ACDI in December 2020. He holds a PhD in Agricultural and Resource Economics from Colorado State University in the US. He was a sustainability leadership fellow at the School of Global Environmental Sustainability during the 2019-2020 academic year and a PhD student research fellow at the Africa Rice Center in 2019. He obtained a Collaborative MSc in Agricultural and Applied Economics from Egerton University in Kenya and University of Pretoria in South Africa. Before starting his PhD, he worked for a CGIAR project in Zambia as Research Manager for an agriculture for nutrition and health project. He also worked as a Research Fellow at the University of Zambia Institute of Economic and Social Research. His research interests include nutrition, gender in agriculture, climate change, and natural resource economics. For his PhD dissertation, he studied the effectiveness of forests as natural insurance for nutrition, how weather shocks affect risk attitudes of smallholder farmers and hence their investment decisions, and provided an alternative explanation for the ‘hungry farmer paradox’.

Email: Kelvin.Mulungu@uct.ac.za

Nondumiso studied Journalism and Media Studies and Anthropology at Rhodes University, a Postgraduate Diploma in Tertiary Education, from UNISA. In 2016 she did a Foundation course in Design Thinking offered by the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design Thinking at UCT. For four semesters she has coached four groups of postgraduate students at UCT in Design Thinking. She is currently finishing her Masters in Adult Education. Her broad interests are Design Thinking as a tool for social change and Professionalization of Adult Educators in South Africa.

Tel: +27 (0)21 650 2556 · Email: nondumiso.mginywa@uct.ac.za

Designation: Professor, Environmental and Geographical Sciences Department

Expertise: Climate Impacts Modelling; Climate Change Attribution; Loss and Damage; Adaptation Finance

Mark New is a Professor in the Department of Environmental and Geographical Science at UCT. He is also Director of the ARUA (African Research Universities Alliance) Centre of Excellence for Climate and Development, in which UCT partners with the University of Ghana and Nairobi University, to drive pan-African research and teaching on climate change in Africa. In 2023, Mark received the Frontiers Planet Prize, which awards research that contributes towards solutions to planetary environmental problems such as climate change, biodiversity loss, and water overuse. He has also been awarded the for Piers Sellers Prize for world leading contributions to solution-focused climate research, has twice been named in Apolitical’s list of the 100 most influential people in climate policy, and is the leading African scientist on the Reuters “Hot List” of influential climate scientists. In addition to his senior management positions, Mark has over twenty-five years’ experience in climate change research, teaching and project management. His research has encompassed detection of climate change trends, climate modelling and scenarios, assessment of uncertainty in climate projections and impacts, attribution of climate change impacts, and climate change adaptation. His current research focuses on climate change risk and climate adaptation, an African focus, including: (i) improved understanding of climate processes, climate projections, climate risk and attribution; (ii) climate impacts and adaptation, especially with regard to water, agriculture and food security, and compound impacts across sectors; (iii) barriers and enablers of climate adaptation and resilience. He has also contributed to scholarship and teaching on engaged research and transdisciplinary leadership. Mark has been principal investigator on over twenty research projects, including ASSAR (Adaptation at Scale in Semi-Arid Regions) a 10M Dollar project from 2014-2018 that worked across 10 countries in Africa and Asia and SAF-ADAPT (the South Africa – Flanders Adaptation Research and Training Collaboration) an $3M project aimed at building research capacity on climate change adaptation in South Africa. He has served in a range of science and policy coordination, advisory and editorial roles, including as (i) Editor for Global Environmental Change and Environmental Research Letters, (ii) as an author on a number of IPCC reports, most recently as Coordinating Lead Author for Chapter 17 of the current Working Group II Sixth Assessment, (iii) a Science Committee member for the World Adaptation Science Programme, and (iv) a member of the Science Review Group for the UK Met Office Hadley Centre for Climate Science and Services; and (v) an advisor to the SA National Biodiversity Institute’s Green Climate Fund project pipeline. Read more

Tel: +27 (0)21 650 2920

Email: Please contact Mark New directly for research related matters: mark.new@uct.ac.za

Designation: Leads the Global Risk Governance Programme
Expertise: Environmental and physical security, with a focus on the development of theoretical understandings that can be used to enhance the quality of security and justice governance

Prof. Clifford Shearing leads the Global Risk Governance Programme. He holds professorships at the Law Faculty, University of Cape Town; Griffith Institute of Criminology, Griffith University, Australia; the School of Criminology, University of Montreal and the Durban University of Technology, as well as a visiting position at the University of New South Wales.  Clifford obtained a PhD in Sociology at the University of Toronto in 1977. He is an NRF A-rated researcher.

Clifford is a well-established and internationally recognised scholar in the field of policing and security. His research and writing has focused on the development of theoretical understandings that can be used to enhance the quality of security and justice governance. A focus of his work has been contributing to the development of institutions and processes that enhance the ability of poor collectivities to both direct and add value to their security and justice. He has also been developing research on environmental security. Read more.

Tel: +27 21 650 3072 / 3451 · Email: clifford.shearing@uct.ac.za

Designation: Science Engagement Lead: Climate Systems Analysis Group
Expertise: Climate services, adaptation, scientific capacity building, user engagement in developing decision-relevant climate information

Anna is the lead on climate services in the Climate System Analysis Group. Her background is in applied climate science with a current research focus on the engagement of users and decision-makers in the use of climate information. Through Anna’s expertise in stakeholder engagement and climate services, she plays a key role in implementing and managing ‘research into use’ projects at CSAG as well as implementing capacity building initiatives. Her research interests include, Climate services, User engagement in developing decision-relevant climate information, and science into use. Anna also has more than five years of previous experience working at the UK Climate Impacts Programme.

As an ACDI associate, Anna has worked with ACDI on many collaborative projects. Some examples of these projects include an analysis of the barriers and opportunities for Scientific Capacity Development in Africa, the development of South Africa’s Third National Communication and the development of climate profiles for African countries.

Email: asteynor@csag.uct.ac.za

Expertise: low carbon policy, energy policy, economics, critical complexity, complex systems thinking, transdisciplinarity

An economist by training, Emily has focused on climate mitigation in a development context for over 18 years and brings both an economics and complex systems perspective to the policy and practical challenges she encounters in this space. Engaging predominantly with the sustainability transitions and critical complexity theory literatures, Emily’s research agenda considers the ability of these and other theories to gain insight into and support just energy transitions in the South African context, with implications for - and learning from - similar transitions underway globally. 

Whilst South Africa is Emily’s home and work focus, she has an appreciation for the international context of domestic climate and energy policymaking through her engagement in international partnerships and work in the EU, Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa. She has worked across a wide range of related issues, including: corporate carbon strategies, climate finance, UNFCCC mechanisms applied to developing countries, South African carbon pricing policies, low carbon transition planning, energy policy, carbon budgeting, and power sector employment.

Emily works predominantly in a consulting capacity and is frequently engaged in transdisciplinary research initiatives relating to her field.

Tel: +27 (0) 72 225 5619 · Email: Emily.tyler@uct.ac.za · Web: www.emilytyler.co.za

Designation: Professor, Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment
Expertise: Climate change mitigation; energy and climate policy; energy and environmental economics; sustainable development; mitigation

Harald Winkler is a Professor within the Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment at the University of Cape Town. He is rated as an “internationally acclaimed researcher” (B2) by SA’s National Research Foundation, is a member of editorial boards of five international journals, has been a member of the SA delegation to the negotiations under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and been a lead author lead author for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Working Group III on mitigation. Harald’s research interests are focused around climate policy, at international and national level. He led the research work underpinning South Africa’s Long-Term Mitigation Scenarios (LTMS). From 2010 to 2015, a significant focus of his work with other developing countries to share the LTMS experience in a programme called MAPS – Mitigation Action Plans and Scenarios (see www.mapsprogramme.org). He developed the proposal of sustainable development policies and measures (SD-PAMs). Current focus areas and research interests include: the future of the climate regime and implementation of the Paris Agreement, Equity and climate change, including work on ‘equitable access to sustainable development’, equity in nationally determined contributions and ‘zero poverty zero emissions’ pathways, Sustainable energy paths for South Africa, particularly in energy use and supply,  Comparative analysis of mitigation actions in cities and  in developing countries. Harald has taught and supervised postgraduates since 2000, including teaching in the ACDI courses. and with his ERC colleagues ensures there is a focus on energy and mitigation. Harald was also part of the Steering Committee that set up ACDI.

Email: harald.winkler@uct.ac.za

Designation: Research Officer, Climate Systems Analysis Group
Expertise: Climate change and hydrology

In principle, Piotr is a hydrologist, but in terms of his recent research and activities, he seem to be sitting on a fence, between water and climate. So, he can define himself as a hydro-climatologist. Since joining CSAG formally in 2012, Piotr has been using climate model outputs for hydrological analyses in the context of climate change impact assessment, attribution and seasonal forecasting. He has also been running attribution experiments. Piotr also works on various aspects of visualization and presentation of climate data, that include articulation of uncertainties, developing visualizations such as "plume plots", and analytical tools such as "SOM-space trajectories", and doing all sorts of analyses that often include bootstrapping. It thus seems that in broader context, he revels in figuring out how the uncertainties and errors propagate through the various processing steps that are involved in translating climate data into (hopefully) useful information. Read more.