Kelly Klima

@KellyKlima1 on Twitter

Associate Director, Management, Technology, and Capabilities Program, RAND Homeland Security Research Division; Senior Engineer; Affiliate Faculty, Pardee RAND Graduate School

Santa Monica Office

Education

Ph.D. in engineering & public policy, Carnegie Mellon University; M.S. in earth, atmosphere, & planetary science, MIT; M.S. in aeronautics & astronautics, MIT; B.S. in mechanical engineering, Caltech

Media Resources

This researcher is available for interviews.

To arrange an interview, contact the RAND Office of Media Relations at (310) 451-6913, or email media@rand.org.

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Overview

Kelly Klima is an associate director of the Management, Technology, and Capabilities Program (MTC) within the RAND Homeland Security Research Division (HSRD), and a senior engineer at the RAND Corporation. She has over ten years of experience in decision analysis on energy and the environment. Recent energy and climate work has focused on natural gas decommissioning, resilience of California's electricity infrastructure to current and future natural hazards, energy equity now and in the future, and geographic smoothing of solar photovoltaics. Klima's research work supports community resilience for extreme heat and flooding throughout the world, and has been applied in the City of Pittsburgh, City of St. Paul, counties in New Jersey, Washington, D.C., and New York City. She also serves as a Pardee RAND Graduate School faculty member, an adjunct assistant professor at Carnegie Mellon University, and a summer associate mentor. Klima holds a CFM from the Association of State Floodplain Managers and a CCEA from the International Cost Estimating and Analysis Association. She earned her Ph.D. in engineering and public policy from Carnegie Mellon University.

Research Focus

Concurrent Non-RAND Positions

Adjunct Assistant Professor, Carnegie Mellon University

Selected Publications

Aviva Loew, Paulina Jaramillo, Haibo Zhai, Rahim Ali, Bart Nijssen, Yifan Cheng, and Kelly Klima, "Fossil fuel–fired power plant operations under a changing climate," Climatic Change, 163(1), 2020

Priscillia Hunt; Kelly Klima "The Measurement of Disaster Recovery Efficiency Using Data Envelopment Analysis: An Application to Electric Power Restoration," in , Research in Mathematics and Public Policy., Springer, 2020

Diogo Prosdocimi; Kelly Klima, "Health Effects of Heat Vulnerability in Rio de Janeiro: A Validation Model for Policy Applications," SN Applied Sciences, 2(12), 2020

Kelly Klima; Lobna El Gammal; Weilong David Kong; Diogo Prosdocimi, "Creating a Water Risk Index to Improve Community Resilience," IBM Journal of Research and Development, 64(1/2), 2019

Roger Lueken; Kelly Klima; W. Michael Griffin; Jay Apt, "The climate and health effects of a USA switch from coal to gas electricity generation," Energy, 109, 2016

DeVynne Farquharson; Paulina Jaramillo; Greg Schivley; Kelly Klima; Derrick Carlson; Constantine Samaras, "Beyond global warming potential: a comparative application of climate impact metrics for the life cycle assessment of coal and natural gas based electricity," Journal of Industrial Ecology, 21(4), 2017

Kelly Klima; Jay Apt, "Geographic smoothing of solar PV: results from Gujarat," Environmental Research Letters, 109(10), 2015

Kelly Klima; Jay Apt; Mahesh Bandi; Paul Happy; Clyde Loutan; Russell Young, "Geographic smoothing of solar photovoltaic electric power production in the Western USA," Journal of Renewable and Sustainable Energy, 10(5), 2018

Honors & Awards

Certified Floodplain Manager, Association of State Floodplain Managers
Certified Cost Estimator/Analyst, International Cost Estimating & Analysis Association

Commentary

Disaster Recovery Operations

Counting the Costs: Improving Disaster Recovery Cost Estimation
Estimating the cost of disasters is a complex process. Disaster recovery is complicated even further during this new era of COVID-19, when extra precautions must be taken. How can we estimate costs quickly and reliably, thus improving the flow of dollars back into the community?
Sep 30, 2020
Natural Hazards Center

Publications

Report
How Can DoD Compare Damage Costs Against Resilience Investment Costs for Climate-Driven Natural Hazards? Overview of an Analytic Approach, Its Advantages, and Its Limitations
This report assesses methods to compare the damage costs from climate change-related extreme weather events against the costs of investing in U.S. Department of Defense installation resilience.
Feb 2, 2023
Report
Emerging Technology Beyond 2035: Scenario-Based Technology Assessment for Future Military Contingencies
This report presents the development and implementation of a technology assessment process to help the Army understand the implications of key emerging technologies that could be important for Army missions in the years 2035 to 2050.
Aug 29, 2022
Report
Adaptive Engagement for Undergoverned Spaces: Concepts, Challenges, and Prospects for New Approaches
This report is a compendium of expert insights regarding opportunities for investing in science and technology to increase U.S. ability to engage in long-term competition in undergoverned spaces.
Jul 13, 2022
Report
Assessing the Effectiveness of Future Concepts in the U.S. Air Force: Application to Future Logistics Concepts
RAND researchers present a Future Logistics Concept Assessment Framework, which is a disciplined, systematic way to assess proposed future logistics concepts to meet the requirements of the National Defense Strategy.
Mar 7, 2022
Journal Article
A Multicity Analysis of Daytime Surface Urban Heat Islands in India and the US
Satellite data and various spectral indices are used to predict surface heat. Built-up indices used in the U.S. do not differentiate sparse vegetation and built-up surfaces, and thus fail in India.
Feb 25, 2022
Report
Equity Metrics for Climate Adaptation in the Electricity Sector
Social equity has become a key concern among public agencies. The authors developed an illustrative set of context-specific equity metrics that Southern California Edison could build on and incorporate into its ongoing work toward climate adaptation.
Feb 17, 2022
Report
Developing Metrics and Scoring Procedures to Support Mitigation Grant Program Decisionmaking
To develop metrics that can inform decisionmaking for awarding predisaster mitigation grants, the authors established three lines of effort (LoEs) for analysis. Each LoE produced a metric or framework that could support grant decisionmaking.
Mar 31, 2021
Journal Article
The Measurement of Disaster Recovery Efficiency Using Data Envelopment Analysis: An Application to Electric Power Restoration
This paper considers disaster severity to assess efficiency for electric utilities. We provide an application to recent post-hurricane restoration activities across different electric power companies in the states and territories of the United States.
Dec 15, 2020
Report
A Model of the Spread of the COVID-19 Pandemic During a Hurricane in Virginia
The threat of the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic increases the complexity of risk management decisions during the hurricane season. This report examines the implications that a hurricane during the pandemic would have for Virginia.
Dec 9, 2020
Journal Article
Health Effects of Heat Vulnerability in Rio De Janeiro: A Validation Model for Policy Applications
Here we investigate how to construct and validate a heat vulnerability index given uncertainty ranges in data for the city of Rio de Janeiro. We find that we can validate the heat vulnerability index against excess deaths during heat waves.
Nov 10, 2020
Journal Article
Fossil Fuel–Fired Power Plant Operations Under a Changing Climate
In this analysis, we used a power plant modeling tool to study how a variety of power plant configurations respond to varying meteorological conditions.
Oct 13, 2020
Report
The Risk-Mitigation Value of the Transportation Worker Identification Credential: A Comprehensive Security Assessment of the TWIC Program
The Transportation Worker Identification Credential (TWIC) is designed to enhance security at U.S. ports. This report provides the findings from an assessment of the TWIC program, along with the assessors' recommendations.
May 13, 2020
Report
Military Applications of Artificial Intelligence: Ethical Concerns in an Uncertain World
The authors of this report examine military applications of artificial intelligence (AI); compare development efforts in the United States, China, and Russia; and consider the ethical implications of employing military AI in war and peace.
Apr 28, 2020
Research Brief
How the U.S. Coast Guard Can Leverage Social Media and Enhanced Cell Phone Data to Improve Emergency Response
Researchers are helping the U.S. Department of Homeland Security understand how social media might be better leveraged for situational awareness—particularly location information—in U.S. Coast Guard response operations.
Mar 17, 2020
Report
U.S. Coast Guard Emergency Response and Disaster Operations: Using Social Media for Situational Awareness
Researchers are helping the U.S. Department of Homeland Security understand whether and how social media might be better leveraged for situational awareness in U.S. Coast Guard response operations.
Mar 17, 2020
Journal Article
Effective Game-Based Training for Police Officer Decision-Making: Linking Missions, Skills, and Virtual Content
This paper reports the result of a two-year pilot study that developed a framework for implementing low-cost, game-based, virtual reality technology for training police officers to improve their decision-making under stress.
2020
Journal Article
Culture and Cognition: Understanding Public Perceptions of Risk and (In)Action
This model demonstrates how cognitive structure, cultural schema, and environment awareness could be combined to improve risk communication. Case studies: one on decision makers facing extreme heat, and another on homeowners facing flood events.
Dec 12, 2019
Journal Article
Creating a Water Risk Index to Improve Community Resilience
We demonstrate two methods to combine water hazard data with a derived water vulnerability index to characterize water risk. We then compare the costs of two potential government policies: buyout of the home versus funding for foundation elevation.
Oct 23, 2019
Journal Article
Performance Comparison of Solar Photovoltaic Models for Plant Siting in India
India will add 100 GW of solar electric power generation by 2022. This report examines the performance of four annual solar photovoltaic production models against actual generation data from utility-scale plants in Gujarat, India.
Jan 9, 2019
Journal Article
Geographic Smoothing of Solar Photovoltaic Electric Power Production in the Western USA
We examined the geographic smoothing of solar photovoltaic generation from 15 utility-scale plants in California, Nevada, and Arizona and from 19 commercial building installations in California.
Nov 28, 2018
Journal Article
SUCCEED: Summer Center for Climate, Energy, and Environmental DecisionMaking
Conference paper describing an annual summerschool held at Carnegie Mellon University that was started by Kelly Klima.
Nov 28, 2018
Journal Article
Surface Heat Assessment for Developed Environments: Optimizing Urban Temperature Monitoring
A variety of metrics are used to optimize the placement of temperature measures to best support decision-making for monitoring and responding to extreme heat risk. This optimal sensor placement methodology is demonstrated for Pittsburgh.
Nov 27, 2018
Report
Estimating the Global Cost of Cyber Risk: Methodology and Examples
This report shares a transparent and adaptable methodology for estimating present and future global costs of cyber risk. The report has a companion Excel-based modeling and simulation platform that allows users to alter assumptions.
Jan 15, 2018
Journal Article
Decision Making Under Deep Uncertainty: Climate Change and Infrastructure Management
This chapter very briefly addresses issues and approaches to decision making on adaptation to climate change.
2018
Journal Article
Hidden-Model Processes for Adaptive Management Under Uncertain Climate Change
This paper proposes a set of optimization procedures based on the Markov decision process (MDP) framework to support decision making depending on the assumed learning rate.
2017
Journal Article
Preparing For Local Adaptation: A Study of Community Understanding and Support
We surveyed 1385 Pittsburghers on: (1) beliefs and knowledge about stormwater, (2) drivers of events, (3) support for green and gray infrastructure, and (4) the factors that explain their support.
2017
Journal Article
Surface Heat Assessment for Developed Environments: Probabilistic Urban Temperature Modeling
We describe how fine resolution simulations of historic extreme heat events are generated and used to train a probabilistic spatio-temporal model of the temperature distribution in an urban area.
2017