About Us

Dr. Carolyn Kousky is Associate Vice President for Economics and Policy at the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF).

Before joining EDF, Dr. Kousky was Executive Director at the Wharton Risk Management and Decision Processes Center at the University of Pennsylvania, where she founded and directed the Policy Incubator. Her research examines multiple aspects of disaster insurance markets, disaster finance, climate risk management, and policy approaches for increasing resilience. She has published numerous articles, reports, and book chapters on the economics and policy of climate risk and disaster insurance markets, and is routinely cited in media outlets including NPR, The New York Times, and The Financial Times, among many others.

Kousky also is the vice-chair of the California Climate Insurance Working Group, a university fellow at Resources for the Future, and a member of the Roundtable on Risk and Resilience of Extreme Events at the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. She has a BS in Earth Systems from Stanford University and a PhD in Public Policy from Harvard University.